


Stretch Out My Life and Pick the Seams Out

by NyxEtoile, OlivesAwl



Series: A Brush With the Devil Can Clear Your Mind [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: And plenty of make-up sex, Childhood emotional abuse, F/M, Healing in a tropical setting, Howard was a terrible parent, Hurt/Comfort, Infertility, Miscarriage, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychology, Therapy, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2019-10-03 10:58:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 38,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17282789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NyxEtoile/pseuds/NyxEtoile, https://archiveofourown.org/users/OlivesAwl/pseuds/OlivesAwl
Summary: “You need to talk to someone, Tony. Someone who can help you actuallydealwith things.”If he had a dollar for every time someone had told him that he'd have a sizable fund to pay said help out of. He had always resisted. Stubborn pride, old fashioned ideas. Maybe just the thought of telling a stranger all his demons made him sick to his stomach. But if this was rock bottom, maybe it was time to try something new. "I know."Pepper looked over at him, clearly surprised by the answer. Suspicious of it. “I’m drowning,” she said quietly. “Just trying to hold you together. I don’t have anyone holding me.”That, out of everything the last couple of days, hurt the most. But it also gave him the strength to say, "I'll get help."





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So there's that scene in Civil War where Tony is stumbling to explain that he and Pepper broke up, and Steve asks if she's pregnant, and he says "definitely not" in a way that poked my muse. (I admittedly do see that topic through the lens of my very long fertility struggles). We saw Spiderman and started writing this as story about what happened in the gap between those movies and why Tony was such a jackass to Peter. We sputtered out because it was a little heavy for our moods at the time. . . only to have a really freakin' shitty 2018 and decide to pick it up a month or two ago. (This is a very long way of saying it has no relation to the stuff at the beginning of Infinity Wars)
> 
> We decided Tony needed a shrink, and a new bromance. (AKA: Everything's better with Doc in it)
> 
> (For those unfamiliar with our work, Dr. Newbury and Dr. Yee are OCs that pop up in a number of our stories. You don't need to have read any of it.)
> 
> The title is from Mumford & Sons song _Lover of the Light_

In retrospect, Pepper could pinpoint exactly when it started.

"You kind of skimmed past at the beginning. Did you say Barton has a farm?"

She'd gone on a business trip to Australia, and while she was gone, Tony accidentally built a crazy, homicidal robot. Explaining the background to the alarming footage she'd seen of him and Bruce wrecking a city had been the first priority of this particular phone call. "Yes. A farm and livestock. Also a wife and a couple kids."

Well that surprised her into silence. "Barton? Seriously?"

"Could have knocked all of us over with a feather." Tony sighed, she could hear the exhaustion in his voice. God knew how long he'd go without sleeping. He'd said the rest of the team was sleeping for leaving for Korea in the morning. He'd called her instead. "I wonder sometimes. I mean my father was so shitty, I just assumed I'd be shitty parent. But maybe it would be nice to have an actual family."

Yep. He was really tired. "You'd probably first need stop getting up to catastrophic trouble when I go out of town first."

"Fair point. Maybe it is time to get out of the game. Once this is done."

"Like the last time you got out of the game?"

"Also a fair point. But there was HYDRA to deal with, and I kind of had to. They almost blew us up."

She stared out at the Sydney skyline. "Promise me you'll try and sleep."

"I'll try. The beds here are pretty comfortable."

There was world-saving to do after that. And then he was busy orchestrating the building of an Avengers facility in upstate NY. His mind was elsewhere. But he did seem a little at loose ends sometimes. She hadn't realized just how much of a steadying influence Bruce had been on him until he was gone. Tony was just a little harsher. A little more. . .Howard.

Then he came home one afternoon and said, "I want build a farm."

It seemed more productive than building 4 dozen suits again, so she agreed. It was Tony, so it was more estate than farm, on a big sprawl of hilly land up the California's Central Coast. They only thing that grew there was Pinot Noir grapes. But it was peaceful. They both unwound whenever they were there. 

One Sunday night while they were drifting to sleep—they both had places to be in the morning—he said, "What would you think about having a baby?"

Later she'd wonder just how different so many things would have been if she'd just said no, right then. But she'd had wine, and did apparently possess some manner of biological clock after all. "It's not completely crazy. But also kind of unlikely at my age."

"There's science for that," he replied.

Once Tony had his teeth in something, that was pretty much it. What harm could testing do? From the testing they learned two things: that she was in far better shape than expected for a woman over 40, and that having a regular low level of radiation in your body around the clock for years, a bout of palladium poisoning, and continued daily exposure could make a man very nearly sterile.

Clint's farm was the beginning of the beginning. That day in the doctors office was the beginning of the end.

The doctors told him not to wear the suit for three full months, and then they'd try IVF. So commenced the year of her being a nag, while he found an urgent reason to put one on every 4 to 6 weeks.

And he sunk back into shades of his father again. He became obsessed with building a neural interface so he could interact with his memories. She thought therapy might work better and not cost half a billion dollars, but she had a company to run and she kind of had to trust him to be a grown up.

The longest he went without putting the suit on was 84 days. On day 85, there he was on her TV, rescuing people from a mine collapse in South America.

It was, without a doubt, the ugliest fight they had ever had. They both fought dirty on a good day, and this wasn't a good day. Not matter how strong your relationship, there are still lines not to cross, things not to say. Get two brilliant, sarcastic, ruthless and hurt people and turn them on each other, and unforgivable things get said.

Righteous anger got her all the way to a hotel with a straight face. Then she sat on the bed and cried her eyes out for a whole mess of things.

There was no point in talking until the two of them calmed down, which would take at least a week. They could use a break from each other anyway. But neither of them seemed willing to reach first, and some gnawing, awful feeling told her this might not be so much _a_ break as _the_ break. Like they'd finally gone over that line. Mostly she hurried herself in work, but as the weekend loomed she decided to go lounge around in a spa somewhere that there were no men. And no televisions—Tony was in Germany doing something governmental with the Avengers and she didn't want to keep seeing news reports about it.

While she was gone, all hell had broken loose.

*

Outside, a jet was taking off. Of course it was. It's not like Steve was going to give Tony a lift back to civilization before fleeing into the sunset. He had his murderous best buddy now. Why not destroy Tony's suit—shatter the arc reactor—and leave him to freeze to death in the Siberian Tundra with no way home. His chest was killing him, and he couldn't tell if it was cracked ribs or a heart attack. For a second there he'd really thought Steve was going to bash his head in, or maybe decapitate him, with that stupid shield.

Probably would have been more efficient than freezing to death.

Well, he'd been in worse situations than this before. Right? He let out a slow breath and slowly sat up. The chest pain spread but didn't increase and he wasn't lightheaded. Broken ribs were looking like the sure bet. That didn't get him home, either, of course.

Okay. Steve and Shithead had come in a stolen jet. Tony had come in the suit. Mr. Machavellian Chessmaster downstairs had to have come in something, right? So, just find that and he was home free. Back in New York in time for a liquid dinner. 

Unpowered, the suit was impossible to walk in, so he had to pry his way out of it. His ribs loved that, and his left arm was injured enough it was half useless. He took the shield with him—vibranium was incredibly rare, he could melt it down and make something with it.

Outside the silo, he was surprised to find his own Quinjet sitting there. Empty. He was too grateful to ponder that particular mystery.

Dropping the shield in the hold he powered it up and got it airborne before setting the auto pilot on and leaning back gingerly in the seat. He was just going to rest his eyes for a little bit.

He woke up to angry, frantic beeping and a throbbing headache. The energy banks were empty and he was perilously close to falling out of the sky. It reminded him, suddenly, of the time he’d accidentally flown to Tennessee after Killian blew up his house. 

He’d told FRIDAY to go home. He’d been expecting the compound in New York. Instead he was circling over his vineyard in California. 

Well. Shit. He grabbed the stick and coaxed her over to the landing pad with inches to spare. Wincing, he managed to get up and walk like a very, very old man to the back of the plane and out the ramp. There would be clothes and a hot tub. He could order food. One foot in front of the other, Anthony. You're almost there.

The walk to the house seemed to be at least five or ten miles long. It was a warm day. It would probably be stuffy in there. They didn’t have air conditioning, and it had vintage windows. Pepper had wanted to keep them when they remodeled the house. But hey, at least they looked to be open, so he wouldn’t have to wrestle with them.

The windows were open.

Someone was home.

There were a finite number of people who knew about this place and most of them were in the RAFT or on the lam. It mostly only left Pepper, Happy and Rhodey and he knew, unquestionably, were two of those people were.

Then, feeling a bit like an idiot, he knocked on his own damn front door.

The door opened, and there she was on the other side, thankfully looking more horrified than angry. “Jesus, what happened to you?”

"Fist fight with two super soldiers." He paused. "After a fight with, like half my team and a giant guy."

“That part made the news.” 

"Yeah, I bet. Can I come in and pass out somewhere?"

Pepper sighed a little. “Yeah, come into the bathroom, I’ll clean up your face.”

"Thanks." He shuffled inside, following her to the back. He sat on the closed toilet seat when she pointed and waited for her to gather supplies. "I didn't think anyone would be here," he offered by way of explanation. 

“I’m the one who shouldn’t be here,” she said, soaking a washcloth in cold water. “This house is in your name.” She came over with it and began to wipe the dried blood off his face.

Well, _he_ certainly hadn't wanted to say it. "Why are you here?"

“Masochism. And I have stuff here.” She touched his nose and pain radiated in every direction. “I think this is broken.”

"I agree," he said thinly. "It can keep the ribs company."

She bent and caught the edge of his t-shirt. “Can you lift your arms?”

Taking as deep a breath as he could, he obeyed. The left one didn't go very high. The shoulder had been dislocated in one of the earlier fights. Gingerly she managed to get the T-shirt off. What he could see of his chest when he looked down was mostly bruise.

“Maybe you should go to the hospital,” Pepper said, though clearly she didn’t expect him to agree to that, because she was already crouched down inspecting the bruises.

He probably should. This was a level of injury that probably required X-rays and doctors. Prescription meds. But God above was that the last thing he wanted to do. "It'll make the news. I'm not up for that."

She nodded. “I’ll put on butterfly bandages on the cuts. They’ll probably scar. I can wrap your ribs. If you flew from Europe, you’d probably be dead by now if you had internal bleeding. But could we at least go down to your lair in the basement and let FRIDAY scan you?”

"Yeah. I can probably manage that."

Downstairs in his workshop, FRIDAY pronounced him free of internal bleeding, and that his ribs were badly bruised but not broken, except one where his titanium sternum met real bone. “It might heal,” she said. “It might require surgery. Though if you hadn’a had it you’d probably have collapsed lungs.” She paused. “Told ya you couldn’t take Captain Rogers hand-to-hand.”

He sighed. "Yes, thank you. I wasn't exactly listening to reason at the time."

“ _Steve_ did this to you?” Pepper sounded horrified.

"Yeah. And his friend a little bit. But mostly Steve." He'd actually had the better hand on Barnes for most of it.

“He pulled his punches,” FRIDAY said. “You had your helmet open, and the pounds per square inch that Captain Rogers usually punches with is more than sufficient to cave in a human skull.”

"Well, wasn't that nice of him." He supposed it was. It would have been easier to just kill him or knock him out. Steve had known full well he wasn't going to stop.

“It probably was, considering you seemed to be trying to kill him.”

“FRIDAY,” Pepper growled with surprising ferocity. “Knock it off.”

Tony wanted to arch a brow at her, but his face hurt. "I gotta write an AI with tact."

“You would need some yourself to do that effectively,” she replied. She stood, holding both her hands out to him. “Come on. I want you in the shower before I wrap your ribs.”

"Yes, ma'am," he mumbled, letting her help him to his feet. He had to lean on her a little to get upstairs. He was going to need to find somewhere to collapse sooner rather than later.

The shower in the master bathroom had a bench in it—they liked having sex in the shower, and soap and water were slippery. She seemed to assess his level of stability, then stripped down to her underwear and got in there with him. She even washed his hair, which was good because there was blood in it and he couldn't lift his arms that high.

Being clean helped more than he would have predicted. A little of the stiffness went away and he felt slightly more alert. "Is there food?"

“Yes, but it’s Me food,” she replied as she carefully wrapped his chest in an ace bandage. Pepper ate healthy things. She casually traced her finger over the scar down the middle. He knew she did it reflexively, something she’d done for so long it was habit. She’d told him once it was like a touchstone, a reminder of what was and what could have been. He was pretty sure the last few weeks were the longest she’d gone without doing it in years.

He covered her hand with his, holding it against his chest. "I suppose You food in sufficient quantities would do."

She turned her hand a little to hold on to his, and for a second he missed her so much he couldn’t breathe. That or she had wrapped his ribs to tight. “Come on, let’s get you settled on the couch packed in with some ice, and I’ll make you lunch.”

"Thank you, Pep," he said sincerely.

She ruffled his damp hair gently. “I love you. Doesn’t turn off like a light switch.”

"Yeah," he said softly. He reached up and stroked her hip. "Still, thanks."

She nodded. “Come on.”

Sure enough, she got him tucked on the big comfy couch, propped up with pillows, and then carefully surrounded his ribs with ice packs. He dozed a little, and when he opened his eyes she was setting down a tray with a pile of crackers, cheese, and fruit. Plus a glass of water and two white pills.

"What're those?" he mumbled.

“Vicodin. You get beat up a lot, I have a stash.”

"I love you."

“Just for my drugs.” She leaned over to very gently kiss his forehead. “Eat something with it.”

He nodded and picked up a cracker and put cheese on it. She disappeared somewhere in the house while he ate. To get away from him or give him his space, he didn’t really know. If ever made a catalog of the worst weeks of his life, this would be very near the top.

After half the crackers were gone, he took the pills, then polished off the rest, even eating the apple and orange slices. Food was good. Even rabbit food.

Pepper reappeared, magically, when he was done. The pills were starting to kick in. Opiates were great for all kinds of pain, physical and emotional. She took the tray. “You want to stay here or go lay in the bedroom?”

He could probably pass out on the kitchen tile, but he'd wake up happier after something soft. "Bed," he said, holding up a hand for help up. She moved the ice and then helped him stand. The bed was soft, and it smelled like her. He’d missed that.

"Call New York," he muttered. "Tell Happy I'm alive. See how Rhodey's doing."

“I will,” she said. “Get some sleep.”

He mumbled something incoherent. Despite how exhausted he was, he wasn't sure if he'd really sleep again. It was hard enough to come by on a normal day, let alone when he'd watched a video of his parents being murdered. Still, it would make her happy, so he closed his eyes.

And was asleep in minutes.


	2. Chapter 2

Pepper went and dug in the liquor cabinet for the really expensive stuff. “Okay, FRIDAY,” she said. “What the fuck happened?”

"After the incident at the airport, Mr. Stark brought Colonel Rhodes to New York for medical treatment. Evidence came to light that Sergeant Barnes may not have been responsible for the bombing in Vienna."

And so began the long, winding tale that involved Sokovian masterminds, dead supersoldiers in Siberia, and a video of Barnes killing Tony's parents.

"Captain Rogers struck the reactor on the suit and so there is a gap in my knowledge. Mr. Stark returned to the stolen plane with Captain Rogers' shield and asked me to take him home."

Pepper sat there in stunned silence for a moment. “Did he kill either of them?”

"No, I don't believe so. Though he destroyed Sergeant Barnes's metal arm."

“How did he end up with the shield?”

“Like I said, there was a gap—“

“No, I know.” She rubbed her eyes and took a drink. “Can you send a message to Happy; tell him Tony is here in California with me. And then put me through to Vision.” She needed calm logic right now, not someone else’s emotions to manage.

"Of course. Do you want him on screen or just audio?"

“Just audio, please, I’m not wearing a bra.” Not that Vision would care.

"Understood."

There was a pause, long enough for Pepper to get up and refill her drink, then Vision's voice, "Hello, Ms. Potts."

“Our wayward mutual friend has shown up on my doorstep.”

"I'm pleased to hear Tony is alive and in good hands."

“How’s Rhodey?”

"Out of his first surgery and doing well. He is heavily medicated for the pain but the doctors are happy with the results."

“Tony is really beat up but won’t go to the hospital. FRIDAY says nothing seems life threatening so I patched him up the best I could and put him to bed.”

"It is my understanding he went to confront Captain Rogers and Sergeant Barnes. I take it that did not go well?"

“From the look of him, it did not. Apparently the whole thing was some sort of trap by a vengeful Sokovian, I guess to try and get them to kill each each other.” She took another drink. “Hydra had Howard and Maria killed. Barnes did it. There was a video.” 

"That does sound like a bad situation. Though that does explain the news I received that the king of Wakanda delivered a Sokovian man to the JTTF and announced him as the true perpetrator of the Vienna bombing."

FRIDAY hadn’t said anything about the King, but she’d been pretty busy. “Well, at least they caught the guy.”

"Yes. I have heard no word regarding the whereabouts of Captain Rogers or Sergeant Barnes."

“FRIDAY thinks they’re still alive, but god knows where. I hope no one shows up here, I like this house.” Not that that really mattered. This property was Tony’s. She should probably pack her stuff and go, but he was in no shape to be alone.

"I don't pretend to know Captain Rogers's thoughts, but I would imagine the most prudent thing for him to do right now is lay low."

She was silent a long moment. “I don’t know what to do now.”

"Do you feel it is necessary for you to do something?"

“Considering where his mental state is—having just seen his parents murdered, and tried to have a fight to the death with one of his closest friends—I’m not really in a place to withstand having all that vented onto me. Considering our last conversation. But considering his physical state, I can’t just go.”

"The obvious answer would be to find him a professional to speak to, but I imagine he would be resistant to that idea. If you would like to bring him back the New York compound Mr. Hogan and I could watch over him."

She sighed. “I suppose he gets you guys in the divorce, eh?”

There was a pause which indicated Vision was trying to parse that. "I imagine some sort of. . . custody arrangement? Could be negotiated."

“Tony Stark does not share.” She leaned back on the couch and looked at the ceiling. “Really is for the best we couldn’t get pregnant.” No matter how much it made her ache.

"I am sorry, Ms. Potts. I have no good advice for you."

“I don’t expect you to.” She drained her glass and decided against a third. “I’ll see what shape he’s in in the morning. Are you in a position to come out here if I need you?”

"I would like to wait until Colonel Rhodes is awake and coherent enough to update. But yes, I can come out if you need me."

“Thanks. I’ll keep you posted.”

"We'll speak soon."

Pepper checked on Tony a couple of times, and he seemed to be sleeping soundly. She made herself some dinner, watched some TV, and checked on him once more before going to bed—in one of the guest rooms, since he was in the master. Even though just about every cell in her body screamed to go lay down with him. She missed sleeping next to him.

Her dreams were strange, enough so that it took the screaming a moment to penetrate and for her to realize it wasn’t part of her dream, but apparently coming from him. On instinct and adrenaline she ran across the hall.

Experience had taught her waking him from nightmare was dicey business. But this seemed like an actual night terror, and no way someone with his injuries should be thrashing around like that. 

For her trouble, she got clocked across the jaw, so hard she fell back on her ass. That man could really fucking punch.

She was still waiting for her vision the un-blur when he jerked upright gasping. Then he winced and groaned, pressing a hand to his chest. Then he saw her. "Jesus. Pepper are you all right?"

Carefully she felt her cheek and jaw. Something was bleeding but it wasn’t her nose. Her bottom lip, it felt like. “Well, I don’t think you knocked out any teeth.” She did feel a bit like crying, though very little of that was about her throbbing cheek.

"Oh, God. Honey I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Do you want me to get you some ice?" He started to struggle out of bed.

She got up. “Don’t, don’t, you’re in way worse shape than me. I may need to re-wrap your ribs. FRIDAY, lights.” 

They came on full blast and they both squinted. His chest looked somehow worse than it had earlier. He looked utterly horrified when he got a good look at her face. She hoped that was more about the fact he'd hit her than her actual injuries.

He seemed literally frozen, so she could re-wrap his ribs pretty efficiently. “You need ice.”

"So do you," he pointed out.

“Don’t worry about me,” she replied, pinning the bandage.

"I gotta worry about something."

“It’s fine,” she said. “Hey, now the outside matches the inside.”

He closed his eyes. "Pep-"

“Don’t,” she said, cutting him off. “I’m guessing your outside matches your inside, too.”

He sighed. "Yeah. Today especially."

“Stay here. I’ll go get you more ice and more painkillers.” She leaned over to kiss his temple. “I’ll be right back.”

"I will wait here," he promised.

She stopped in the bathroom to look at her face. That was going to be lovely tomorrow. She got herself an ice pack as well, plus the pills and something for him to take them with. He was sitting right where she'd left him, and held his hands out for the pills when she returned. "Thanks."

She sat on the side of the bed, watching him and holding the ice to her face. “You wanna talk?”

His shoulders slumped and he looked to be thinking it over. "I don't remember what I was dreaming," he offered.

“I imagine your mind has quite the selection,” she replied. “FRIDAY and Vision told me everything that happened. Rhodey is out of surgery and stable, by the way.”

He nodded a managed a ghost of a smile. "Good, that's good.”

“I was going to have Vision come out and look after you, but I really don’t want to be photographed looking like this—you can imagine what the press will say. It may be a couple of days before I can cover it with makeup. So you’re stuck with me.”

Another nod. "I'll try not to be too much trouble.”

“You have been trouble for most of my adult life.”

He opened his mouth, possibly to argue—though how she had no idea—then shut it again. "Once I can stand on my own power I can just. . . tinker in the lab.”

“You don’t have to hide, it’s your house.” She took the ice off her face. The house in Hawaii was hers. They were both on the deed to the one in London. LA was a rental and little more than a crash pad. Stark Industries owned the tower in NY, it was probably debatable who was allowed to live there. Everything else was entirely his. Her head was killing her and crying was sounding appealing again.

"I just don't want to fight," he said quietly. "I'm not up for it. Not this week.”

She could appreciate that. She really could. He was clearly having the worst couple of days he’d had in a very long time. But then, it kind of always was. Whatever was wrong with him was always bigger. That it was usually genuinely bigger didn’t make it any easier for her to handle. Her hurt was still real. And he was so wrapped up in his own shit all the time, she didn’t even know if he ever noticed. Hell, he could apparently literally punch her in the face and decide he didn’t feel like talking about it.

She pinched the bridge of her nose and scrunched up her face, which hurt like hell. She really didn’t want to cry with an audience. What was worse was that most of her just wanted to crawl in that bed with him. “Okay. I’m going to go back to bed. If you have another nightmare, don’t be offended if I wake you with a stick or something.”

"Sounds fair." He looked up at her. "Sleep tight."

“You too,” she told him, and then retreated back to her own room.

*

Tony dozed for a while, mostly because of the pills, but never really got back to sleep. He got up with the dawn and made his way to the kitchen, cobbling together a smoothie for himself and leaving the rest in the fridge with a note for Pepper. Then he headed down to the lab.

He hadn't been here in a while, so there wasn't much current to work on. Still his brain needed activity and his hands needed something to do, so he started tinkering.

After unearthing an old suit prototype, he took it apart to brainstorm ideas for leg braces to make for Rhodey. He was going to need them. It would have been easier, of course, if he was in NY. “FRIDAY, why did you bring me here?”

“The first time you asked me to take you home, I told you you had seven houses, please choose one. You told me home was wherever Pepper was. I've done so ever since.”

Yeah, that made sense. "How long has she been staying here?"

“Just yesterday. Before that she was at a spa nearby.”

Lucky her. "This has been a shitty week, FRIDAY."

“It certainly seems to have been. Though it is now Sunday, so technically a new week.”

"Ah. Well, maybe this one will be better."

“There is always hope, boss.”

He didn't recall programing her with optimism, but there it was.

Not long after that Pepper came downstairs. Her face looked worse than it had last night, and he felt a stab of guilt. “Hey, you want some lunch?”

His stomach growled before he had a chance to answer. "Apparently so. Did you see the smoothie I left for you?" he asked, standing slowly. He'd stiffened up, hunching over his work.

“I did, thank you.” She inclined her head. “I thought you’d be sore, I put the hot tub on.” 

"You're a goddess," he told her sincerely.

That got a smile out of her, even if it did make her wince. “I know.”

"Are you going to join me?" he asked, deciding to push his luck.

She looked a little surprised. “You want me to?”

"I like your company." Certainly better than being alone with his thoughts.

She was quiet a moment, a shadow of something sad crossing her eyes. He was sure she’d say no. But then she nodded. “All right.”

He gestured to the stairs. "After lunch?"

“Yeah. Come on up, I made sandwiches.”

They headed up to the kitchen and she put his sandwich in front of him, with two more pills. "Thank you for taking care of me," he said quietly.

She stopped next to him, and touched his arm. “Like I said yesterday. . . It doesn’t turn off.” 

He covered her hand with his and squeezed gently. "I know. Still grateful."

“It’s what I do,” she replied. She went and got her own sandwich. “I’ve been doing it so long, it’s probably part of my personality. You need me and I come.”

He wanted to tell her if he'd known she was here he wouldn't have come, but he was pretty sure that was a lie. He did enjoy her company, especially when he was lost and hurting. It wasn't fair to her and he knew that, too.

The silence stretched, and then she said, “I know you don’t want to fight. But at some point we are going to have to talk.”

"I know." It'd probably be good. Lance the wound and be done with it. "Hot tub first?"

“Yeah.” When they were done eating, she went in search of bathing suits. It was kind of strange but so very them. Compartmentalizing. Being practical and relaxing a little before having what was sure to be a pretty miserable conversation. 

The hot tub felt amazing. It would probably make the bruises worse, but for the sore muscles there was nothing better. Felt a little odd that not twenty four hours ago he'd been fighting to the death. But such was the rhythm of his life sometimes.

Pepper’s bikini was very tiny. He probably shouldn’t be enjoying that as much as he was.

For a few minutes they sat in almost companionable silence, soaking in the heat and calm. Then he said, "I'm sorry about your face. And about. . . intruding on you here."

“Whatever might be your fault, I don’t think either of those things are,” she told him.

"I'm also sorry for putting being Iron Man over being with you." That was almost certainly his fault.

She turned, looking kind of… pissed. “Did you not hear a word I said last week?”

He blinked. "I thought I did but now I'm second guessing myself."

“You professed to want to have a baby, but couldn’t stop for the brief period of time the doctors asked you to. If I suggested we stop, you got pissed at me. One time you told me it wouldn’t be such a problem if I was younger. Meanwhile I’m taking all this crazy medication for no good reason, but I’m an asshole for expecting you to, in return, simply _not_ do something.”

Oddly enough, that was what he'd been apologizing for, but clearly the nuance had been lost. "I can't even tell you why," he admitted. "I did want a baby with you. I still do. I just. . . Maybe I was just afraid."

“Of what?”

He took a breath. _Just say it, Tony. If this is the last conversation you have with this woman, at least make it an honest one._ "That even if I kept the suit off for 3 months I'd still be sterile. And the door would be closed and that would be it. So if I put it off. . . I never had to know."

“Ah,” she said quietly. She reached out to touch his arm. She put her fingers down one at a time, something she did when she wasn’t sure if she should touch him or how much. He had everything about her memorized, down to little things like that. After a moment, she said, “You always say you can’t do the equation unless you have all the variables. It honestly never occurred to me there was data you didn’t want.”

"It wasn't even conscious. Not really. The last time I was doing really well. There were days I didn't even think of it. Then FRIDAY mentioned something about scheduling a test and I just. . . panicked. The mine thing happened and I did what I did."

“We can’t just float in limbo forever.”

"I know." He took a breath and let it out slowly. "I guess the idea of letting it go was harder than I expected."

“There are other options out there.”

"There are," he agreed. "I just. . . needed to wrap my head around it."

She leaned her head back against the side of the hot tub. “If it’s of any help, my body really couldn’t afford the wasted year. At this point the odds aren’t great regardless of what’s going on with you.” He could see her looking up at the clear sky above them, filled with the kind of stars you never saw near cities. “Of course, you can go get that 25 year old, no problem.”

"Pretty sure a twenty five year old would kill me, at this point."

“Would kill me, too,” she replied, so quiet he barely heard it.

It was his turn to reach out and touch her cautiously. "I wouldn't do it."

She closed her eyes. “You have every right to live your life.”

"Fine. I wouldn't _want_ to." It had been a shitty thing to say, and absolute bullshit. From that day he lay bleeding out in the desert and thought about her as he drifted off, he had never wanted anyone else. It had always been her.

She rubbed her eyes. “So what do we do now?” Her voice caught. “I don’t know what to do now.”

"I don't know either," he admitted. Today was full of confessions. "But I don't want to lose you."

“You’ve been kind of a jerk lately. Like time is unwinding backwards. Or maybe this is just how Stark men age. Whatever it is, it sure hasn’t felt like you don’t want to lose me.”

"I get tangled up in my head. The blinders go on and I fuck up. The last few years it seems like it's been one hit after another."

“This week probably isn’t going to help any of that.”

"Probably." He flicked some water idly. "Or maybe it's just the rock bottom I needed."

“You need to talk to someone, Tony. Someone who can help you actually _deal_ with things.”

If he had a dollar for every time someone had told him that he'd have a sizable fund to pay said help out of. He had always resisted. Stubborn pride, old fashioned ideas. Maybe just the thought of telling a stranger all his demons made him sick to his stomach. But if this was rock bottom, maybe it was time to try something new. "I know."

She looked over at him, clearly surprised by the answer. Suspicious of it. “I’m drowning,” she said quietly. “Just trying to hold you together. I don’t have anyone holding me.”

That, out of everything the last couple of days, hurt the most. But it also gave him the strength to say, "I'll get help."

Pepper nodded. He still didn’t know if she believed him. “Okay.”

"What else?"

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

"We were discussing what we do now. I need help. I'll get some. What else?" They both did better with plans.

“Honestly, I thought you were going to blow me off and this conversation was going to be about how to divide our shared assets.” She took a deep breath. “In all fairness, there’s got to be some part of this that’s my fault.”

"You did hit a couple of sore points in that last fight."

“I think we’re probably square and rehashing that would not do us any good.”

"Agreed."

“The rest we can discuss once you get some of your shit sorted out. But I need. . .I need to be able to lean on you sometimes, too.”

He nodded. It was a goal, something to aim for. He was good at goals.


	3. Chapter 3

They were reasonably companionable the rest of the day. Tony supposed that meant the air was cleared. No one was packing. His whole body hurt, so he didn’t do much other than call back east and make the phone rounds. Rhodey insisted he was doing great—Tony assumed there was morphine involved—and fussed over whether Tony himself was okay.

“Pepper is here,” he said, hoping that would make him feel better.

There was a moment of silence. “You tell that woman I said she’s a saint.”

"I will. I don't disagree." He paused, then figured if the conversation got out of hand he'd blame it on the morphine. "She's convinced me to talk to someone."

“Are you actually gonna do it?”

"I am going to give it a try," he said carefully.

“You have to try for more than one appointment.”

"What do you think my minimum goal should be?"

“Six weeks? Though honestly it probably needs to be more like six months, but baby steps.”

"I can promise six weeks."It would probably take that long just to explain his issues. "Now I just need to find one who won't see their notes to Buzzfeed."

“You could call the lady Pepper saw after that whole Mandarin thing. God alone knows what was said about you that never made it out.” He paused. “Yeah, okay, maybe call that lady for a recommendation.”

"It's a place to start." He paused. "You ever see one?"

“After Afghanistan, when I thought you were dead.”

That made sense. "You like it?"

“I don’t know that it was enjoyable, but it sure helps. A neutral person to vent to so you don’t drown your loved ones.”

"I guess there are worse things."

“There are a _lot_ of worse things.”

Yeah, he would know. "I'll be back in New York in a few days. I may have a surprise for you when I do."

“I hope it’s a new suit. Vision fried mine.”

"After a fashion, it is."

After the call, he tinkered with the leg braces a while, until Pepper came downstairs with water and painkillers and orders to sleep.

They knocked him out well enough, but he had the same vivid, terrifying dreams that vanished from his memory, and left only the fear behind. When he jerked awake he was alone in the dark bedroom. He tried to catch is breath, tried to shake off the dream, and then Pepper appeared in the doorway. At least he hadn’t hit her this time. “Sorry,” he mumbled.

She came into the room. “You were calling for me.”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. "I think you were there. In the dream. Getting hurt."

“Ah. That’s one of your frequent fliers.” Because of course she had some mental catalog of his nightmares. She looked at him a moment, then pulled back the covers and climbed into the bed.

"What're you doing?" he asked, concerned he sounded a little horrified maiden.

“Don’t worry, I’m not trying to molest you.” She sounded exasperated.

"Sorry. I just. . . am surprised."

“You always tell me you sleep better when I’m here,” she sounded a little uncertain now. 

"I do," he said quietly. "I always do."

“Well, okay, then.” She settled down, making herself comfortable. Then she reached out and tucked her hand into his. He squeezed her hand gently and resettled. He already felt better, just feeling her heat and listening to the sound of her breathing. She kissed his bare shoulder, and whispered, “Sleep.”

"Mmm." He grumbled and closed his eyes. "Yes dear.”

*

The truth was, Pepper slept better next to him, too. Though she did wake up in the morning and have a moment before she remembered what had happened. The sun was barely up, so she sat there for a few minutes, watching him sleep. That cut over his left eye should have been stitched and was going to leave quite a scar. She leaned over him to make sure the butterfly bandages she’d put on it were secure.

“Mmm, this is a nice—ow!” He didn’t get through whatever he had started to say because he’d tried lifting his left arm. It had probably been commentary about her boobs in his face.

“Careful,” she said gently.

"Stupid frail human body," he muttered.

“Maybe we should get you a titanium shoulder to go with your sternum.” She reached further to get the painkillers and glass of water on the nightstand.

"Mmm, I'm not entirely opposed." He managed to get his arm moving, apparently, because she felt his hand cup her hip to help brace her.

“Sorry,” she said, because she probably jostled him. Sitting back down, she shook out two pills and handed them over with the glass.

He sighed but obediently took the pills and popped them in his mouth before taking the glass to swallow them down. "Thanks for coming in last night.”

She put the glass and bottle on her nightstand, and he settled back down. “I remember after the Mandarin, I used to wake up in the middle of the night convinced I was burning up. You made those blankets that would make me feel cool without actually chilling my perfectly normal body. I’d wake up and you’d wrap me in one."

He smiled. "I remember. It would put you right back to sleep, usually.”

She shook her head. “Never thought I’d miss those days.”

"Things seemed. . . simpler then.”

It was certainly a time she’d felt hopeful. Like maybe all the nonsense was ending. But it seemed more like the nonsense was the status quo. She’d need to learn to live with it, or. . .not. “I told you once you were the only person I had. Still true.”

He opened his eyes and met her gaze. "You too, Pepper.”

Against what was probably her better judgement, she leaned down and kissed him. He sighed in what sounded like relief, threading his fingers into her hair as he kissed her back. She shouldn’t, she shouldn’t, but she missed him so much. Right now it felt like the universe was righting itself bit by bit. 

Slowly, he sat up, deepening the kiss and easing his other arm around her. She lifted her head just enough to whisper, “Careful.”

"I feel just fine," he assured her, stroking her hair out of her face.

“That’s probably the drugs,” she told him. His hand drifted down the side of her face, over her jaw and down her throat, along her shoulder. He hooked his pinkie under the strap of her tank top, hesitating like he was asking permission. When she nodded, he dragged it down, then dipped his head and kissed the bare skin he revealed. He then did the same on the other side, mouth edging closer and closer to her breast.

They still had things to work out. She was still hurt. She was still mad at him. But she missed him. She needed him. This. The connection and the things they couldn’t seem to say. The beginning of forgiveness. “Hold on,” she whispered.

He stopped immediately, bless him. "What is it?”

“I don’t want you to hurt yourself worse,” she said, so she pulled her tank top over her head.

He grinned widely, because he was still Tony. "But what a way to go.”

“You wouldn’t die,” she said, “You just become an invalid I had to—ah!” He’d leaned forward enough to capture on of her nipples in his mouth, and she lost her train of thought. He pulled her closer and she straddled him.

"That's my girl," he murmured, moving to her other breast. He tugged on her hips, and she rocked against him, feeling the hard line of his growing erection through his sweat pants.

“I am,” she replied, giving in entirely. They were good at this, always had been. It was the one thing that always worked. She gave his hair a little tug and he looked up at her. She touched the edge of the bandages on his forehead, then said, “Lay back, let me do the work.”

For a moment, he looked like he'd protest. Then he sighed, gave her breast a smacking kiss, and obeyed, leaning back on the pillows, hands cupping her hips. "If you insist.”

She bent down enough to kiss him again, intense and deep. He moved his good hand off her hip, and under her pajama bottoms. This wasn’t exactly letting her do the work, but it felt so good she just ground against him while his fingers slid against her clit.

He teased her as they kissed, eventually slipping two fingers inside her and stroking, groaning at how wet she was. She sucked in air and caught his wrist. “Stop, you’re going to make me come.”

"Isn't that the point?" he mumbled.

She laughed out loud. She really adored him, even when she couldn’t stand him. “Oh, shut up.” Carefully she swung her leg back off of him so she could wiggle out of the pajama pants. He made a noise of protest, and then one of pain as he apparently moved the wrong way.

“Get back here,” he said when she opened her mouth to comment on it. So she kissed him as she pushed him back against the pillows. She knew his body so well she could shove his pants out of the way and sink down on him without breaking the kiss.

It elicited a groan that spilled from his mouth to hers. His hands cupped her hips again, squeezing and massaging a moment, before tugging to get her to move. She rocked up on her knees and back down again a few time, until he began to lift up to meet her. Then she rolled her hips, rocking faster and faster. Her eyes fluttered and she looked down at him. He was watching her with that intensity of his, something she found unbearably hot in moments like this. He liked to watch her fall apart, liked to see every moment of it.

So she let him, holding his eyes while everything inside her shattered. Tony gave a noise like a growl, hands tightening on her and holding her to him as he lifted into her, finding his own pleasure. She whimpered, bending down to rest her forehead against his while she caught her breath. Tears stung her eyes.

He'd closed his eyes when he came. When they fluttered back open he clearly saw the dampness in her eyes because he lifted a hand to stroke her cheek. “Hey.”

Pepper turned her face into his hand. “I missed you.”

"I missed you, too," he said softly. "So much.”

Gently, careful of the bruising, she traced her finger over the scar down the middle of his chest. “I keep almost losing you.”

"Well, you know, life of a superhero." He sighed. "Not all it's cracked up to be.”

She climbed off of him and stretched out along his side, resting her head on his shoulder. She could feel him relaxing, done in by sex and painkillers. It was good, sleep was healing. She laid there, letting her mind wander, until she was sure she wasn’t going to fall back asleep herself. 

Then she got up to take a shower. Her face looked somehow even worse than yesterday, but she knew tomorrow it would be yellow enough she could cover it with make-up. 

She made breakfast, and pulled out her laptop to check in with work and check the news. Stark Industries’ stock had crashed, like it did every time Tony did something stupid in public.

She answered emails and soothed ruffled feathers. Tony emerged from the bedroom just as she was starting to cobble together a sandwich for lunch.

"How much shit are we in?" he asked, beelining for the coffee maker.

“No worse than usual. Wall Street is having a tantrum but will get over it. The internet’s pretty freaked out about the Avengers breaking up.”

"It's like the Beatles all over again.”

She sighed. “I hope the UN is happy with itself.”

He sank into a chair at the table and sipped his coffee. "I'm sure they've found a way to be the good guys.”

“The shenanigan at the airport is a sign that they were right about the Avengers being dangerous.” She watched him. “I’m surprised you signed it. You hate cooperating with the government.”

"I wasn't in a great place." He looked down at his mug. "I thought we were doing the right thing. I always think I'm doing the right thing. And more often than not, I was wrong. Thought an objective voice. . . might help.”

She watched him a long moment. “Keep you from following your fear into a South American mine, perhaps?”

He lifted a shoulder. "Maybe. Doesn't seem to have helped much.”

“Recognizing you need limits matters to me,” she said quietly. “Regardless of how sideways the implementation went."

"The intent still matters?”

“When paired with sincere effort and not tossed in at the end, yes.”

"Good to know," he said, nodding.

She finished making her sandwich, and made one for him, too. “In a day or two I’m going to have to go back to LA and back to work.”

"I know." He didn't sound happy about it, of course. "I want to go to New York and help Rhodey.”

“And look into some kind of therapy?”

"Yes. He has some recommendations. Unless that was the morphine talking.”

“He worries about you just as much as I do.”

"I know. And I screw him over just as much.”

She took a bite of her sandwich. His spate of self-awareness was giving her hope. “You should probably see to that, too.”

"I've been working on some legs for him.”

“Good,” she said. “I don’t. . . I don’t know where we are, you and I. I really want to fix it, but I think it’s going to take some time.”

He nodded. "I know. It makes me feel better that there's a chance.”

“There is,” she said. “I promise.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning as promised - the miscarriage mentioned in the tags happens in this and the next chapter.

Tony tried not to read too much into the fact that she came into his bed again that night. She’d been in the office she kept in this house most of the day, getting work done. He made arrangements with Happy for travel back to New York and worked on Rhodey’s legs.

When his arm hurt too much to be useful anymore, he went to bed, and she materialized a few minutes later with water and his pills. “FRIDAY?” he asked.

“She tattles,” Pepper replied. Once he’d taken them, she went around to her side of the bed and meticulously took off her clothes. She wasn’t a woman who slept naked unless she had intentions.

"Ms Potts are you trying to seduce me?”

She sat, and looked back over her shoulder at him. “I was thinking of leaving you with blue balls and going to sleep.”

"That sounds more likely.”

She peeled the blankets back and swung her legs in. Then she turned and slid close enough to stretch out next to him. They had a lot of sex when they were mad at each other. Sometimes it even fed it; they’d get wound up just so they could burn it off. But this was different and he damn well knew it.

He held an arm out so she could cuddle closer if she wanted. She tucked herself up against him, her bare skin pressed against his. He regretted the pajama pants he was wearing. “Can we just not talk about it?” she whispered.

"I'm always in favor of not talking about things," he admitted. She nodded, and she kissed him. 

In the morning, his bruises all hurt worse than they had the night before and most of his left arm was numb. When he stumbled into the bathroom, Pepper was putting makeup on her bruise.

"We're a mess," he said, splashing water on his face. "Did I miss a pain killer round?" he asked the room in general.

“I let you sleep.” She pointed to the bottle with that pointy pink sponge he thought looked like a sex toy. 

"Ah. Glad it's not a heart attack.”

“We probably just overdid it.” She put her makeup down to come over and inspect him anyway. “You need to have a doctor look at that arm when you get back to New York."

"FRIDAY, find me someone who'll come to the compound.”

“Yes, Boss.”

Pepper went back to getting ready. She was doing so in her underwear, and he enjoyed the view. If he wasn’t so damn beat up he could probably lift her right up on that counter. She was watching him in the mirror like she was thinking the same thing.

Sex had never, ever been their problem.

He briefly considered a shower, but decided it would probably make his bruises hurt more. So he kissed her shoulder, scooped up his pills and headed to the kitchen to make coffee.

When she came out she was fully dressed, and her face looked surprisingly normal. She got herself a cup of coffee and asked, “Do you want me to stay until Vision gets here?” He was coming out to fly Tony’s jet back to New York because he wasn’t in the best shape to do so himself.

"I wouldn't say no," he admitted. "But if you have things you need to get to, I understand.”

“I wouldn’t have offered if I minded.”

"Then yeah, some company would be nice.”

She opened the fridge and took out some eggs, which it was quickly apparent she was scrambling. “I told him to bring a sling for your arm.”

He frowned and looked down at it. “It’s fine,” he said, even though he was literally holding it up because it hurt not to.

Pepper rolled her eyes. “You had a car dropped on it it. Not to mention about a dozen previous injuries. That arm is your achilles heel, you probably should just wear a sling all the time."

He paused and looked down at his arm. "Maybe for a day for two.”

“Thank you,” she said, and went back to her eggs. She scooped them out onto two plates and brought one over to him before sitting down with hers. 

"Thank you," he replied, digging into the eggs. They hadn't been seasoned much, but they were warm and fluffy and hit the spot.

“I’m going to drive back down to LA, do some damage control and settle down the board of directors. Can I assure them you’ll stay off TV for a while?"

He lifted a hand. "Cross my heart."

“Get some of your shit dealt with and then we’ll. . .figure this out.”

"Sounds like. . . something approaching a plan.”

There was a wooshing sound outside, and then Vision landed on the patio. He walked right through the wall, and Pepper jumped. “Jesus, I will never get used to that.”

He blinked. "Apologies, Ms. Potts. I've been warned not to I just. . . it slips my mind.”

Vision handed Tony the sling, which he put on. It really did make his arm feel better. Pepper was fussing with taking the plates to the sink and washing them, though the cleaning service could probably handle that.

She walked with them to the plane. He told himself it was at least better than their last goodbye, where she told him to go to hell, and then slammed the door on her way out.

He leaned in and kissed her before getting on. "I'll message you?" he asked cautiously.

“Yeah,” she said. “Let me know how Rhodey is doing.”

"I will. I'll have him contact you if he's coherent.”

She ruffled a bit of his hair, then touched the cut on his temple gently. “Fly safe.”

"I'm in good hands. Be careful on the road. Kick ass.”

She smiled at him and nodded once, then turned to walk back to the house. With immense reluctance, he walked up the ramp.

“You seem to have mended fences,” Vision said once they were in the air.

"We're working on it," Tony amended. "She's giving me a chance and I'm doing my best to deserve it.”

“That sounds fair, given the circumstances.”

"It's more than I thought I'd get.”

“You are better with her than without her.” That was the understatement of the century.

"That's a low bar right now, but I agree." He shook his head. "How's Rhodey?" he asked, hoping to change the subject.

“Doing well. He’s moved to the compound and we’ve got a medical team set up. I’ve been speaking with Dr. Cho and there’s a specialist she recommended. She’s doing clinical trials on nerve regeneration based off some of Dr. Erskine’s original research.” Tony looked over at him sharply, and he added, “Apparently she used to work for SHIELD.” 

"Huh," he said thoughtfully. "FRIDAY, can you pull up any information you have on her? I'm curious now." He _had_ promised Pepper he'd get someone to look at his arm.

Researching Dr. Newbury kept him busy on the flight back to New York. Her resume was impressive. Before SHIELD, she’d done a stint as a trauma surgeon with MSF. Not for the faint of heart. She had a wicked scar on her face that made her look like she could be a Bond Villain. And there was not a single picture of her smiling anywhere on the internet.

"Let's bring her in," he told FRIDAY. "See if she's willing to give me a once over.”

Tony felt a little better once he was back at the compound. Rhodey was in pretty good spirits and happy about his prototype leg braces. The doctor came in for an interview and took absolutely no bullshit.

“I think that’s a shadow of a healed break on your rib,” she told him as she went through all the data FRIDAY provided from the scans in California. “With hairlines it can be hard to tell old from new.” Newbury scrolled on the tablet. “But not even a masochist has sex twice in one day with a broken rib.”

"Well, good thing I'm not -" He stopped and glared ate the ceiling. "Seriously, you reported on that?"

"It's important medical data," the AI replied.

"I think keeping you in the sling for a while is a good idea. Is there any point in giving you some medication?" Newbury asked, apparently ignoring his conversation with the ceiling.

"I'm in a cooperative mood lately, try me.”

“He was taking painkillers in California,” FRIDAY said, apparently to Newbury. “Ms. Potts has the best track record in getting him to do things.”

"I'll give you a second painkiller, something a little less powerful than the one you're on. I also think a blood pressure medication would do you some good. Your reading is a little high and you have a stressful job. Keeping you on an even keel would help your overall health."

Tony ground his teeth a bit but nodded. "All right.”

“And I have gotten permission from above to add Colonel Rhodes to my nerve regeneration study. I told them I hadn’t been able to find an appropriate African American male patient during the original selection process, and it would improve the quality of the data to add one now.”

Now that was great news. "Thank you, I'm sure he'll be thrilled to hear it." He frowned. "Who are you working for, by the way?”

She raised her eyebrows. “Technically, you.”

He waved a hand. “I don’t mean this right now. Otherwise?”

Newbury gave him a look, and repeated, “Technically, you. A quarter of my funding is from the NIH. The rest is from the medical research arm of the Stark Foundation.”

He had a vague memory of conversation about setting something up, after the SHIELD dump effectively put 80 years of super soldier serum research into the public domain, to help doctors do something useful with it. Pepper must have run with it. “Technically, you work for Pepper, then.”

"Well, good, that brings the conflict of interest in treating you down to a manageable level.”

“So now would be a bad time to offer you an actual job?”

"I have an actual job.”

“Obviously I’d want you to keep doing that. We have top of the line research labs here.” He gestured vaguely behind him. “Nicer than anything you’ve got now. We’re like two hours north of the city. Bring your people.” 

She studied him a moment and he could see her processing everything, weighing out pros and cons. Finally, she said, "I'll consider it. I'll give you an answer when I come back to work with Colonel Rhodes."

There were other things he’s promised Pepper, too. He couldn’t believe he was asking this, but he was. “Hey, out of curiosity. . .Do you know any shrinks?”

*

Running a company was a very busy job.

Busy was good. If Pepper was busy, she didn’t need to ponder too much about her own life. She packed her day with meetings and calls and an endless list of decisions. She honestly didn’t know if she and Tony were going to work this out. She hoped, but she also told him she wasn’t going to see him again until he had spoken to an actual mental health professional.

Which he did. He had seen three. And insisted all three were terrible and it wasn’t going to work.

Pepper stayed in LA, and eventually had her assistant look into the logistics of disentangling their finances, just in case. 

All she could do was go forward. If she paused, she’d shatter.

She also had Jess make her a doctor’s appointment so she could go get her damn IUD put back in—not because she expected to need birth control, but because it stopped her periods and she hadn’t liked having them the past year.

“You could also go have some sex,” Jess said. “I’m just saying. Change of scenery after a decade.”

Pepper pinned her with a look. “I’m not jumping ship yet. I’m just. . . workout out the options. Which does not yet include that.” Just thinking about that made something twist and ache inside her. And then think of something. “Jess, what day is it?”

“The 25th,” she said immediately. “Why?”

Pepper pulled out her phone and scrolled through her calendar. She had to go back to the month before last to find the notation. She counted out two weeks forward against and stared at it. “Son of a bitch.”

“You okay?” Jess asked.

Rubbing her forehead, Pepper said, “I am late. Like, really late.”

Jess’s eyebrows went up. “You, uh, you want me to go buy…?” Pepper had gotten a little obsessed with taking pregnancy tests at one point, so lately Jess had bought and dispensed them. Pepper nodded, and Jess left, and then she felt foolish. She wasn’t a young and fertile teenager. She’d had sex exactly twice since her last period. Granted, it was on just the right days, but also the man she was with was mostly shooting blanks. It would be nothing, and then she’d feel worse, or relieved. She honestly couldn’t tell.

As it turned out, _mostly_ did not mean _entirely_. 

Just in case, she sent Jess out for more tests, just in case the three in the box were somehow all defective. Four more tests, from four different brands, all had the same answer. She lined them up on the counter of her office bathroom and stared at them. She let Jess come in and look at them, too.

“I canceled the rest of your afternoon.”

“Thanks.”

After a stretch of silence, standing there staring at the row of white sticks lined up with their positive markings. One of them literally said the word Pregnant in the window. “So, I can’t tell if this is a congratulations thing or an I’m sorry thing,” Jess said.

“Right now, neither can I.” She was too stunned to think in a functional manner.

“I should get you a doctor’s appointment. And a flight to New York.”

Pepper looked over at her. “This is a conversation to have in person, isn’t it?”

She sent Tony a text that night telling him she had something to discuss with him, and was coming to New York. He’d probably worry, but she was content to let him stew a little bit. Particularly because she was going to absolutely make his day.

They had a lot of shit to work out. But suddenly she was sure that somehow they would. They had to figure out how to be parents, and they were both people who liked a challenge.

They’d been in limbo a year. Something, granted, that he had made far worse than it needed to be. But it at least was over. This could be a bit of a fresh start. She hoped. It was the first thing she’d felt really hopeful about in a long time.

Pepper took the private jet to fly overnight so she could get some sleep. It was an easy flight, and she went to bed early. Suddenly it made sense why she had been starting to feel really tired before 9PM. Growing body parts and all.

The flight attendant woke her up a half an hour before landing. She checked her messages to find about 18 questions from Tony, who was in fact worrying. Deciding have pity, she replied. _Landing soon, your torment is nearly over. I promise it will be worth it._

Before she had to strap in for descent, she went to the bathroom. To find enough blood to pop her little bubble of hope.

When they banged on the door—FAA rules and all—she cleaned up as best she could and walked numbly back to her seat. She couldn’t turn around now, but God she wanted to. Go back to LA and pretend this never happened. All of it never happened.

Tony had come to meet the plane on the Avengers compound’s tarmac. Pepper got down the plane’s steps, took one look at him, and burst into tears.

He looked a little panicked, but he immediately stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her, stroking her hair and letting her bury her face in his shoulder. "Are you dying?" he asked softly. "Do I need an omelette?”

“I don’t know,” she mumbled, because she didn’t. “Can we go inside?”

"Of course. Come on." He tucked his arm around her shoulders and led her into the compound.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is more of the miscarriage in this chapter (as is probably obvious from the last)

When they got back to the apartment Tony was staying in, Pepper left him baffled in the living room and went to the bathroom. This wasn’t just emotionally awful, it was also messy and gross and painful. And she had no period supplies whatsoever here, aside from what was in her purse. She was pretty sure Tony would have a stroke before he would go to a store and purchase such a product. Pepper wished she’d brought Jess like she usually did when she traveled. She did the best she could with toilet paper and the spare underwear she kept in her purse. Someone was going to have to out and get something.

She didn’t think she’d been far enough along for this to require medical attention—but then what did she know? It was more than a regular period. And more than she’d bled after the abortion she’d had 20 years ago. They’d told her to come in if it was very heavy.

When she went back out, Tony was hovering on the other side of the door, looking about as worried as she had ever seen him. Before he could say anything, she said, “I may need to go to the hospital. I am having a miscarriage.” It probably too blunt a way to drop all of that on him, but right now she felt so emotionally bruised she had nothing left.

He blinked at her rapidly a moment, then said, "I have a doctor on staff, do you want me to call her?” 

“That would actually be great,” she said quietly. No paparazzi. And it was a woman. 

“I will have Dr. Newbury paged,” FRIDAY said. 

Pepper took a deep breath. “FRIDAY, tell her why and tell her to bring supplies. She’ll know what I mean.”

"Of course, Ms. Potts," the AI said and she swore it sounded sympathetic.

Tony waited a moment, then fidgeted. "Is there anything you need? Toast? Tea?”

“Scotch?”

He held up a finger. "I have that." He left her there and returned a moment later with a double, no ice.

She took a good long swallow. It didn’t burn; he had very, very good booze. She set it down on the coffee table. “God, I am so sorry,” she said, doing her best not to cry and failing.

"It's all right. I feel like you're probably going through more than me right now." He paused. "How long-?”

“I’ve only known since yesterday.” She wiped her eyes. “I should not be this upset, it hasn’t even been a full 24 hours.” 

He rubbed her arm, but before he could say anything, there was a knock at the door. "Dr. Newbury is here, Ms Potts," FRIDAY told her.

She sighed again. “Send her in.”

The door swung open to reveal a woman around Pepper's age, a large black doctor's bag in her hand. She nodded to Tony on her way to Pepper. "I'm Amanda Newbury, Ms. Potts. Would you prefer to speak in private?”

She shook her head. “I’ve had my hand down the hole in his chest, we don’t have any boundaries anymore.” Besides, she kind of wanted him to stay. "And call me Pepper."

Newbury nodded. "Do you know how far along you were?”

“Five and a half weeks, best I can tell. The window is pretty narrow. I literally figured it out yesterday, and flew out here to tell him. Started bleeding on the plane.”

She set her bag down and started digging in it. "Are you bleeding through pads? Cramping? Passing clumps?”

“I only have tampons and pantyliners, but I have blown through the few I had. Hence asking FRIDAY to have you bring some. Yes to both the others.”

She nodded and pulled out a half full box of overnight pads. "This is what I had on hand. It should last long enough for me to run to the store for more. No more tampons until this is over. Put one of these on and see how long until you have to change it. If you're bleeding through it completely in an hour or two, then we'll take you to the medical suite here, but that's pretty rare with a miscarriage this early." She also held out a bottle of pills. "This is a pain killer for the cramps. You'll have about three or four bad days, then it should ease into more of a normal period.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly, very glad she didn’t go to the local ER.

"You're welcome. I know it's hard, but the heavy bleeding is good. It lowers the chance you'll have complications.”

“Well, that is something.” 

"Keep hydrated. Take a multi vitamin and eat red meat and leafy greens. Take it easy a couple of days. I'm just two floors down if you need anything.”

Pepper thanked her, then the doctor said something to Tony she didn’t catch on the way out. Pepper shook two pills out into her hand, and downed them with the rest of her drink. He hovered a moment, then took a seat. "Are you hungry?”

“No, but I probably should put something in my stomach.” Also, she imagined he really wanted something to do.

"I'll make you something. Burger? Salad?”

“Desert. With a lot of chocolate.”

"Yes, ma'am. On it.”

She went into the bathroom to put the pad on, and then laid down on the couch. She hoped her bags made it up here eventually. She wanted her pajamas.

Tony returned with a brownie sundae drowning in chocolate sauce. "My lady.”

“Thank you,” she said, taking it from him and digging in. She folded her legs up and he sat on the other side of the couch. “Hey, apparently we answered the question you were afraid of.”

"Not exactly how I wanted to find out. I assume this is why you were coming out?”

“Yeah,” she said around a mouthful of ice cream. “Seemed like something I should tell you in person.”

"I appreciate the thought." He paused to swallow. "Sorry this is how it ended.”

She closed her eyes, feeling them sting. “Me too.” She decided to shift so she could lean on him while she ate her ice cream. “Here I thought I was out of tears.”

He tucked his arm around her and rubbed her back. "It'll come and go, I'm guessing.”

“It feels like it’s just. . . the pinnacle of a giant pile of shit.” But it was so nice to lean on him. She wanted to pretend their problems didn’t exist, and just stay like this.

"The cherry on top?”

“Yeah. And to think for a minute there I actually thought everything was going to work out.” She reached the brownie at the bottom, which was warm. How he had procured this, she had no idea.

"Maybe that means it's the end? We'll get a little reprieve?”

“I suppose I could just go back to California and pretend this never happened.”

He turned to look at her. "Is that what you want to do?”

“I want to wallow in my self pity and eat ice cream. Watch chick flicks.” She pinched the bridge of her nose like it would help her not cry. “I’ve got nothing. I am empty and just done. I don’t have the capacity to work on things. Or to fight. If I go back to California, Jess will look after me. Without hiding in the basement because my pain makes her feel guilty.”

"I'll take care of you," he said quietly. No quip, no glib assurances. Just soft and genuine.

She looked at him a long moment. “This is the kind of thing where I don’t know if I’ll be able to forgive you if you fuck up.”

He nodded. "I understand.”

“At some point we’re going to need to do some shopping. I don’t have any of my stuff here.” That was the other advantage of California. She’d have her familiar things, which were kind of nice when hurting. “Do you know where my luggage went? I want my pajamas.”

"Yeah, Doc said she'd have someone bring the bags up. I can go check if you want.”

“Please. In the meantime I’m going to take my bra off and lay on this couch.”

"That sounds like a good plan." He kissed her cheek and stood. "More chocolate?”

“All you can find.”

*

When Tony returned with her luggage and chocolate, she was sound asleep on the couch. He left the suitcases beside her, the snacks on the table, and covered her with a blanket. 

Not sure what else to do—but aware he maybe shouldn’t go to his lab—he decided to go downstairs and see Rhodey.

"How's my favorite cyborg?" he asked.

“Fine,” he said. In fact, he was cooking. Doc and the physical therapists wanted him to use the braces to do mundane things. “What about you? Is Pepper here? What was her thing?”

He wasn't entirely sure if he was supposed to say. But it was Rhodey so. . . "She's having a miscarriage.”

“Ah, jeez,” he said. He gestured at one of his kitchen chairs. “I’m sorry man. I didn’t know she was pregnant.”

"Neither did I. Neither did she, until yesterday. She was coming out to tell me she was pregnant but. . .”

“I’m really sorry. How’s she doing?”

"Okay, I guess? I had Doc come look at her and she seemed to think everything was progressing normally. Pepper debated going back to California, but I told her I'd take care of her. So I'm trying to do that.”

“And how are you doing?”

"I don't really know. Still processing, I guess.”

“You say that so often when something happens I’m starting to wonder if ‘processing’ is a synonym for bottling up your feelings until you die of a heart attack. Or build crazy robots.”

Tony was quiet a moment. "It used to mean that.”

“Something different now?”

"I'm trying to figure out how to write this out to my shrink.”

“Okay, that’s fair,” Rhodey said. “You tell Pepper about that?”

He’d talked to three different people, all of whom knew who he was and knew way too much about his life and what they had theorized might be wrong with him. It had made him uncomfortable, and that was probably not a great thing to feel towards one’s mental health professional. But anonymity seemed impossible, given how famous his face was. 

Newbury, ever a font of unique solutions, had found him a therapist who worked over the internet.

"Not yet. Didn't seem like a good time to start talking about me.”

“It might make her feel better, I know she had a thing about that. Though at the moment you should get her whatever makes her happy.” He paused. “And you should go see if Doc’s got any extra socks.”

"That's a brilliant idea." Newbury, in her quest to be extremely weird, knit things. Including very awesome socks.

On way down to see Doc, he considered calling Jess, and having her put a bunch of Pepper’s stuff on a plane. But he didn’t know what Jess knew, or what Pepper would or would not want him to say. She did, however, keep a whole lot of things at their apartment in the Tower in Manhattan. That he could send Happy down to get.

He called Happy in the elevator to pass on the request. Doc didn't look surprised to see him when he stepped in her lab. "How's she doing?"

"Ate a sundae, cried, fell asleep."

She nodded. "Sounds about right.”

“She’s going to stay here for a bit,” he said. His left wrist was sore and he rubbed it. Doc had told him it was nerve damage and he should get used to it. The worst was when it made his pinkie numb. “You’ve seen all my rather dire test results. This is my fault, isn’t it?”

She lifted a shoulder. "Miscarriages happen for all sorts of reasons. Placing blame is futile and damaging. She's a woman past her prime birthing years in a very stressful job who wasn't taking any sort of hormones or multivitamins. It could be that any embryo would have been lost.”

“I’m not going to repeat that third sentence to her.” He sighed. “Though I certainly contribute to her stress level.”

"I'm not going to argue that one.”

“I actually came down here to see if you had any of your socks. Seem like the kind of thing that would be nice when you feel shitty.”

She smiled and pulled open a drawer, rummaging a moment and holding out two pairs. "I hope she likes them.”

He grinned. “Thank you.”

"You're welcome. I dropped off a bag with supplies at your door, too."

“Hiring you was a really good decision.”

He went back to check on Pepper, who was still asleep. He left her the socks and the bag of lady supplies Doc had gotten, and told FRIDAY to let her know he’d gone to his office—not the lab—and to summon him when she woke.

If someone had told him six months ago that he’d choose typing over talking, he’d have laughed. It helped he could do it when he felt like it, not on some predetermined schedule when his brain might be elsewhere. 

_So. Good news and bad news. Good news, turns out I can get someone pregnant. Bad news, she’s already lost it. No, I don’t know how I feel about it._

If his therapist happened to be online, she’d answer him and it might run like a conversation. Other times it took a while to get an answer and it was more like a correspondence. Either worked fine for him. All he knew about her was that her name was Lani Yee and she lived somewhere in California. She knew his first name and the anonymized details of his life. He was going to have to tell her who he was pretty soon; there were a lot of things he couldn’t explain or talk about otherwise. But the topic of the moment—his relationship with Pepper and their baby-making disasters—was as pedestrian as any normal person’s problems. 

**How is your partner feeling? That can be physically very hard as well as emotionally.**  
_She took painkillers with scotch and went to sleep._  
_They came from a doctor._  
**I appreciate the addendum. I presume you didn't have much chance to talk about it?**  
_I told her I’d take care of her. What the hell else should I be saying?_  
**That's a good start. Eventually you should both feel comfortable talking about your feelings. While you should listen to hers, you need to remember that yours are also important and valid. It will help her to know that you're grieving and what you're thinking. She'll feel less alone.**  
_Really? One of her main complaints is that I make everything about me. Which is. . . not wrong._  
**There is a difference between over shadowing her experience by focusing on your own emotions, and showing empathy by assuring her you're feeling similar things. It's part of supporting her. Otherwise you risk coming off as detaching from the situation, which can be isolating.**

“Boss, you wanted me to tell you when she was awake,” FRIDAY said from the ceiling. 

“Right. Thanks. Tell her I’ll be up in a minute.”

 _You’re a woman. Is there anything you’d want at a time like this?_  
**Validation. Comfy clothes. Candy. Sappy movies.**

Pepper had mentioned the movies. He'd have FRIDAY pull up a list. He got the socks and pajamas and Happy was getting more of her stuff. There was plenty of chocolate. And the talking, he was going to need to get better at in a hurry. 

_She’s up now, I’m going to go see her. Talk to you later._  
**Good luck, Tony.**


	6. Chapter 6

When he went upstairs, Pepper had moved to the bedroom. She had put her pajamas on, and the socks, and was on her laptop. “Hey,” she said when she saw him.

"Hey. Happy's going down to the Tower to get some of your stuff.”

He was happy it made her smile. “That’s a good idea.”

"The socks are from Doc, by the way.”

“They are very comfy, thank you. She also sent a very nice heating pad.” She closed her computer. “I told Jess I’m taking a couple days off.”

"Good. You should relax." He pointed to the ceiling. "FRIDAY is queuing up three days worth of your favorite sappy movies.”

“We could have some mutually acceptable movies. Some company would be nice.”

"I'll have her sprinkle in some historical biopics." He went and sat on the bed next to her. "You want to talk at all?”

She looked over at him. “Can I ask you something? If this had happen all while I was still in California, would you have preferred I never tell you?”

He considered a moment. "No. I'd rather know. And I wouldn't want you to do this alone.”

She smiled and nodded, leaning to rest her head on his shoulder. Clearly that had been the right answer. And also the truth. One of the clearest things he’d heard from her their big fight and their weekend at the vineyard was how she felt like she had to carry too much on her own. “Life was simpler when I was your assistant. We just went most places together.”

"I do feel like we saw more of each other before we were dating.”

“I think it’s more about me trying to run a company in California, and you doing your superhero thing mostly in New York. We live half on each coast, and not often enough on the same one at the same time.” She sighed. “I think your instincts about buying the vineyard were correct. It’s like the only time we relax.”

He rubbed her arm. "I do miss you. I mean, on a big scale you tend to keep me from being an idiot. But the little things, too. I sleep better with you. I like to cook for you.”

“The little things are nice. We’ve been through an appalling amount of Big Things.” She lifted her head to look at him. “You know, I’ve been thinking about it. . . in the scheme of our lives, this shouldn’t even be a big deal. How many times has one of us thought the other was dead? We’ve both been tortured. You’ve had enough trauma to earn some psychiatrist a Nobel Prize. We keep putting ourselves back together.”

He smiled and rubbed her arm again. "We are experts at putting ourselves back together." He shrugged and sighed. "I don't know. Maybe the little, normal human things are harder to overcome.”

“Children are probably the most normal human thing there is.”

"For most of the world, yeah.”

“They are also entirely good news. There’s no moral ambiguity about a planned baby. You add something positive to your lives.”

A little concerned where she was going with this, he leaned back a little to look at her. "This one would have been good news. I think.”

“I know. And we could really use some.”

"Yeah." He sighed, wondering what Dr. Yee would say. "Why don't we make some happiness?”

“Trying to get pregnant already nearly broke us once.”

"I know. I didn't mean that. I meant. . . I don't know. Find something that makes us happy and do it." He looked around the room, grasping for inspiration. "We could go on a trip. Travel. See the sights. Watch the sun rise from Machu Picchu, drive a convertible down the Amalfi coast, crash an Indian wedding."

Her mouth opened and closed. “We have a lot of responsibilities. . .”

"I know. But the world won't end if we take some time off.”

That made Pepper chuckle. “I can’t believe _you_ are saying that.”

"I know. I feel I've really grown.”

“There is something to be said for prioritizing ourselves. Each other. Us.” She watched him. “You sure this isn’t just avoiding? 

"I don't think it is. I think it's trying to make our own good. Because the world refuses to give us any willingly.”

“Just us,” she said quietly. “No work. No suit.”

"Just us.”

She stared at him so long, he actually squirmed. He was terrible at games of chicken. And sensed the point here was to stay quiet and wait. Finally she smiled, and said, “Deal.”

*

As part of their respective work, and other vacations they took, Tony and Pepper traveled a lot. It wasn’t a big deal, because technology brought the office right a long with them.

The point of this trip was to unplug, and relax. Which meant there were a lot of arrangements to make. Someone needed to run Stark Industries in the interim, and Tony wanted to build Rhodey a new suit so he and Vision could handle that blew up while they were gone.

Pepper needed to go back to LA to wrangle those details, but she waited until the bleeding had died down. 

“Your hormone levels are coming down well,” Amanda told her. “I can write you a lab order to have another test done in a week to 10 days, and I expect they’ll be zero. But I wouldn’t leave the country until they do, and all bleeding has stopped completely.”

“That makes sense.” Having medical appointments over cookies and tea was absolutely fantastic. And she liked Amanda tremendously. “I have a somewhat awkward question.”

“When can you have sex? Whenever you want to after the bleeding stops.”

Pepper laughed. “Common question?”

"The most common, in these sort of situations.”

“Can I assume this thing was probably a fluke? I don’t want to end up obsessing over it, but also don’t really feel like dealing with new birth control right now.” 

"Well, I obviously can't put your odds at an absolute zero, but given your numbers, yeah, I'd say it was a fluke. The odds of it happening again, without any medical intervention, is pretty small.”

“Good,” she said. That was the least complicated option. 

"Otherwise, how are you feeling?”

Pepper took a drink of her tea. “Physically pretty okay. My head is all over the place. I think taking some time off is a really good idea.”

"For what it's worth, I agree. I am personally terrible at maintaining work-life balance, but I can recognize the need in others.”

“Maybe you should take a vacation while we’re out of town.”

"And leave the place unattended? The kids will hold a party and trash the place.”

“Tony’s got plenty of money, we’ll pay someone to clean it up.”

She laughed. "Maybe I'll see if my dad wants a weekend on the Banks.”

That night she packed up for her trip out to California and told Tony about her conversation with Amanda. “I hope she goes. I may have the travel service Jess hired to make our arrangements call her and tell her they’ll arrange a trip for her, on us.”

"So you've officially adopted her, have you?”

“I’m very fond of her. She got you to take medication.”

"Mostly through threats.”

“Whatever it is, I’ll take it.” She zipped her suitcase. “We should figure out how long we want our trip to be.”

“My therapist said two weeks was a minimum, but recommended more like a month. It’ll take the first half just fully unwind.”

Pepper turned slowly. “You have a therapist?”

"I. . . yes. I haven't mentioned that yet?”

“No. I heard about the three you hated and figured that would be a battle for later.” Even though he’d promised. 

He rubbed his arm idly. "Doc found her, actually. She does it online, through email or text. So she doesn't know who I am and have preconceived notions about me.”

Pepper tilted her head, really impressed. “You actually listened to me.”

"Apparently I can learn. Eventually.”

She came closer, grabbed him by his lapels, and kissed him. “Thank you.”

"Mmm." He cupped her waist in his hands and kissed her deeper, swaying them. "You're very welcome.”

“You’re probably at some point going to have to tell that poor woman who she’s really dealing with.”

"Yeah, I know. I know. I think once the vacation is over I'll fess up. We're getting to the point I need to talk about some very specific stuff.”

“Your life is kind of. . . distinctive.” She touched her forehead to his and closed her eyes. “A month it is.”

"And we'll make it count.”

Pepper spent two weeks working very long hours getting everything buttoned up. Tony was in New York working similar hours, given the hours he sent text messages to her. She threatened to report him to Doc if he didn’t get at least some sleep. She fielded questions numerous times during the day from the travel company coordinating their epic trip. She debated with Tony over whether it was better to have security travel with them, or to let him bring a suit. They settled on light security and him bringing those glasses he had that could remotely connect to his suits. He could send for one if needed.

She felt as stressed out and disconnected as she had before their big fight, but told herself it would be worth it.

He flew out to LA in a suit because she had the jet they were taking—it wasn’t the big jet they took on long haul trips, but the smaller one that could land anywhere. They traded having a full suite and crew for not having to deal with the airport. Jess had their bags packed for them and they were being loaded on when when he landed on the rooftop landing pad right next to the idling jet.

“Cutting it a little close,” she said, aiming for affectionate but missing. She was tired and crabby. 

"I made a pit stop," he replied, holding up a Dunkin' Donuts bag. "Still warm.”

She found herself smiling. “Well, I guess I have to forgive you.” She took the bag and kissed him. “Come on.”

His suit collapsed in on itself, and he joined her in the jet, stretching out into one of the seats. Pepper fished out the itinerary—Jess had printed it on paper. Pepper had only a vague idea of what it contained. She got her coffee and donut out of the bag. “Apparently our first stop is Peru.”

Tony grinned. "Machu Picchu?”

The grin was infectious. “Yes. Also among our many destinations are India and Italy. I wouldn’t be surprised if they found a wedding for us to crash.”

"I am impressed and delighted.”

Jess had made notes on the paper, and they made her laugh. “At some point there will be yurts, and Jess really wants a picture of you riding a camel.”

"I think she's earned that.”

“Fourteen destinations,” she said. “We can skip some or extend it out if we want to. They padded it out to as much as six weeks for the full thing.”

He nodded. "Have we ever had six weeks off?”

“Not unless you count the cave, or recovering from having the arch reactor and shrapnel taken out of your chest.”

"I wouldn't classify those as vacations, no.”

She looked over at him. “What if we can’t stand each other’s company for that long?”

"That would be a discouraging realization.”

“I guess then at least we’ll know.”

He glanced out the window. "Think it's a possibility?”

“Honestly?” Her voice was quiet and apparently serious enough that he turned back towards her. “Not in the slightest. Our problem isn’t together, it’s apart.”

That got her a ghost of a smile. "This should be a fun trip, then.”

The area around Machu Picchu was protected airspace and the closest they could land was more than a hundred miles away, but it was still far closer than they’d have gotten with the big jet. Their pilot, a cheerful young man named Tom who was a former Marine pilot doubled as their security. Their guide and porter met their plane, steering them to a restaurant for lunch, and then to their train. The wood paneled train cars were very old but clearly restored. It even had little brass lamps.

“I feel like I’m in the Pullman car from a western,” she commented as they wound through the mountains.

Tony tipped his head back to look at the closest lamp. "Clearly I'm an eccentric billionaire dragging my poor beleaguered wife west to start a new life.”

“We’re fleeing in shame because we haven’t had 11 children like all our friends. We’re hoping the different air will cure whatever we think is wrong with us, like miasma or my uterus wandering around my body.” She paused and gave him a sideways look. “Too soon?”

"No, no, I found the wandering uterus just the right amount of dark humor.”

She grinned and kissed him. “Good.”

The train ride was slow and full of switchbacks. They ate dinner in a fancy dining car as they wound through the mountains. One person came up to the table having recognized Tony, but they weren’t obnoxious about it, and he was used to it. Pepper made jokes about getting him a disguise.

It was about sunset when they reached tiny village that was the closet to the ruins. Carved into the side of a mountain, its streets were so narrow the whole place was pedestrian only. Their porter took their bags to the hotel and the guide took them village market packed full of stalls selling all sorts of things.

Pepper stopped to look at shawls, and in her peripheral vision she could see Tony put in the ear piece that connected him to FRIDAY. She made a face at him, and he said, “For translation. So I can haggle. They speak Quechua.”

“You are way too rich to haggle at a Peruvian street bazaar. Just pay the woman.”

"They don't respect you if you don't haggle a little," he protested. 

She shook her head at him. “Fine. Get two.”

“Colors?"

“Surprise me.”

He pecked her cheek and leaned into talk to the stall owner, both of them pointing empathically at various shawls. She walked on to the next booth, letting him make his purchase. She bought a beaded necklace perfectly fine without haggling.

Pepper got two booths down before turning around to find out what happened to him. He was taking pictures with the shawl lady, and what looked like her entire extended family. This finished with him kissing both the lady's cheeks and strolling over to Pepper, laden down with way more than two shawls.  
"About that disguise," he said when he reached her.

She took one of the shawls, shook it out, and draped it over his head. “There you go.”

"Thanks, very funny. Almost as good as Steve's baseball caps.” 

She laughed, and used it to pull him close enough to kiss. For the first time in what felt like ages, she felt happy.


	7. Chapter 7

Their hotel was a collection of adobe casitas tucked among the trees crawling up a mountainside. Inside their little villa, all you could seen in any direction was jungle, little more than shapes in the growing darkness. Tony walked all the way to the big glass doors and out onto the terrace. They could have been the only people in the world.

Pepper came out and stood next to him, wrapped in at least two of the shawls. “Look at those stars.”

He reached over and tugged her into his side. "Did you know that different cultures had different constellations for the same stars?”

She put her head on his shoulder. “I did not.” He could feel her sigh, but it sounded more contented than anything else. “How are you feeling?”

"Really good," he said honestly. "Like there's been a weight on my chest and I can finally breath easily.”

“Me too. Is this what relaxing feels like?”

"I think it might be.”

She lifted her head and he felt her lips against his neck below his ear before she whispered, “Come back inside?”

"If you insist." He kissed her as he turned. "Want to leave the doors open?”

She leaned into him to meet the kiss. “We’re on a mountain, it’ll get cold.”

"I'll warm you right up.”

“Mmm, I believe that.” She kissed him again. “There’s a fireplace. Go put it on while I take a quick shower. And leave the doors open.”

"Your wish is my command," he told her. She went back in, and for a moment he just stood there to watch her walk. 

The fireplace didn’t have a switch to turn on like most hotel fireplaces. There was a stack of wood, some kindling, and some matches. It was like boy scout camp all over again. If he’d actually done something like boy scouts. Or camp.

Still, he was a relatively capable man with a better than average grasp of thermodynamics. By the time Pepper came out of the bathroom he had a nice little blaze going. "I have made fire," he informed her, gesturing grandly.

“That is very nice fire,” she said, going and standing next to it for a moment. She had on a white hotel robe that she hadn’t entirely tied—out of casual comfort or deliberate enticement he didn’t know. Their relationship was often a mix of both.

She crossed to the other wall to turn off the room lights, aside from the fire. Then she smiled at him. “It has been way too long.”

"Since you relaxed?" he asked. "Or since we. . .?”

She laughed. “Well, both.” 

"I guess the two do go hand in hand.”

She came towards him, slowly peeling the robe off her shoulders and letting it slide down her arms. Her skin was pink from what must have been very hot water. “I am so tired of missing you.”

He caught her around the waist as she reached him. "I'm right here.” She kissed him, hands sliding up his arms until she could wrap them around his neck. Between the distance and the miscarriage and fight and the simmering issues that had been going on before that it had been a long time since they’d been together without some kind of. . .undertone. 

He leaned back long enough to tug his shirt off, so he could feel her skin against his, then he wrapped her back in his arms, kissing her as he danced her towards the bed.

She trailed her fingers up his sides and over his chest. “Anything hurt?”

"No," he said, after taking a moment to assess. "Which is rather novel in itself.”

“That is very novel.” She grinned very widely at him and sat back on the bed, propping herself on her arms. “Think of the possibilities.” For a moment all he could do was stare at how gorgeous she was, so she reached up to tug on his beltloops. “Come here.”

With a groan, he let her pull him down, kissing her deeply. He braced himself on his palms, caging her between his arms on the bed. It was a messy, intimate kiss; one they got lost in. They had all the time in the world.

When he lifted his head, she stretched her arms over her head, arching up like an offering. He dipped his head again, this time bending to kiss her breast, sucking the nipple into his mouth. She made a soft noise, and he could feel her heartbeat pick up. Her fingers sifted into his hair, and she made a sharper sound when he moved to the other breast.

He stroked a hand along her side, her skin warm from the shower, a contrast to the cool mountain air coming in from the doors. He shifted to the side, bracing on an elbow, just enough that he could continue his exploration down her body. She shivered, and but just the same he could feel her melting under his touch. He had her memorized, every curve and angle, every swell and dip, every part of her skin. He knew where all her freckles were, where she was ticklish, all her scars and all their stories.

“Do not tickle me,” she murmured, because she apparently could read his mind.

"Where's the trust?" he asked, fingers sliding along her sex. "Where's the romance?”

“Mmm,” she hummed, opening her legs for him. “I’m hoping we’ll find them again.”

He kissed her belly, swirling his fingers around her clit. "This a good start?”

He could feel as much as hear her breathless laugh, and her hand stroked the back of his neck. “This is an excellent start.”

With one more kiss to her stomach, he scooted down a bit more and brought his mouth to her clit. She made a very desperate sounding whimper and arched up. This he had memorized, too. The exact pace and pattern, until she writhed enough he had to hold her still, and she cried out loud enough it was probably audible in the jungle.

He sat up and stretched his back out while she was distracted calming down. He recalled hoping he wasn't getting too old for this particular activity. Then he resettled next to her on the bed, waiting while she caught her breath.

She turned her head towards him, and reached up to touch his face with a hand that trembled a little. She looked sort of stunned, which made him inordinately proud. He kissed her palm. "I still got it.” It had been kind of a while—they’d had a lot of rushed sex of late.

“I adore you,” she whispered, pulling him down to kiss her. 

He got lost in the kiss a few moments, then rolled away to rid himself of his pants. When he rolled back the kiss was deeper and more intense. She turned onto her side so she could press her entire body against his. One leg slid along his until she hitched it up over his hip, and she was so wet he could feel it on the inside of her thigh. Her hand slipped between them and her fingers wrapped around his cock in a slow stroke. She knew him just as well.

Hips rocking, he got distracted my her stroking. So much so, it almost surprised him when he felt her shift and position him at her entrance. With a groan, he kissed her shoulder and sank into her heat. She ground against him as they pushed and pulled slowly against each other, and when their mouths met again the rhythm of the kiss matched it. He cupped his hand under her thigh and pulled her leg higher. Something about the motion made her break the kiss to gasp.

He used his grip on her leg to hold her still, then tipped his hips, stroking into her at a different angle, one that made her gasp again. He murmured encouragement to her, feeling her grow hotter around him. 

They couldn’t move very much, making for a torturously slow climb. But one he could feel every moment of. He could feel her tighten and tense and just hang there on the edge. Her nails bit into the skin on his arm. “Please,” she whispered, not usually one to beg. “Please, please, please.” It sounded a bit like prayer, and she repeated it until she finally went over the edge.

There was no holding on after that. He followed her quickly, burying himself deeply as he came. They drifted for a moment after that, each lost in their own pleasure. Then she moved enough to kiss him tenderly. She flattened her hand on his chest, over the scar. Over his heart, which was still pounding against his ribcage. With tremendous effort he lifted a hand to cover hers. She opened her eyes and met his, and neither of them really had do say anything.

He’d have been content to stay like that all night. Except his back was to the open door and the air blowing in from it was now actively cold. When he moved, Pepper mumbled, “Stay, you’re my windbreak.”

"I'm closing the doors," he informed her, giving her a smacking kiss before rolling to his feet.

She’d pulled back the covers and gotten under them by the time he came back. She lifted up a corner and said, “You know, our body clocks think it’s like dinnertime.”

"Are you saying you want room service?”

“I’m saying come back to bed, we need to tire ourselves out.”

There had been a time in their relationship when twice in one night wasn’t unheard of, but it had been years. Three, you’d have to back further, before his heart surgery. But apparently there was something about the mountain air.

The fire had burned down to embers. She was laying on her stomach and he was stretched out beside her, idly rubbing her back. “I think it’s further than that,” she said. “Before the battle of New York. When we were still in that fuck-on-every-surface mode.”

"Mmm." He took a moment to remember that time fondly. "We were like bunnies then.”

“I remember. We had a lot of pent up stuff to burn off.” She smiled. “Probably tonight, too.”

"Seems a reasonable theory." He yawned. "How long do you think we'll be able to keep it up.”

“We should probably restrain ourselves a little bit. A remote village in the Andes is not the place I want to have. UTI.”

He patted her back. "We'll have to wear ourselves out sight seeing instead.”

They drifted off after that and it was the last thing he remembered. It was still dark out when an alarm chiming woke him up. He glared blearily at Pepper’s back as she climbed out of bed. “Come on,” she said over her shoulder. “They’ll have breakfast for us on the ride up.”

"Jesus. When I talked about watching the sunrise I was using romantic hyperbole.”

“You’re welcome to stay, but I want to see it.” Pepper, of course, was a morning person.

"Will there be epic amounts of coffee?”

“Fresh local coffee, even. We’re in a coffee growing region.”

Somewhere in her various bits of advice, Lani had told him to sometimes do things for her that she knew he didn’t want to, and don’t complain. And so with only one more groan, he hauled himself out of bed and started getting dressed.

There was a bus ride up a very precarious road which seemed even more precarious in the twilight. The coffee was abundant, and so good it alone was worth getting out of bed.

Eventually they were sitting on a ledge above the city’s ruins, watching the line of sunlight slid down the mountain slopes and across the old stonework. Pepper laced their fingers together and rested her head on his shoulder.

"Okay," he said quietly, kissing the top of her head. "This is worth getting out of bed for.”

*

_Easter Island, Chile_

“You know, I think there is a past life version of you where you had someone carve a giant stone monolith of you.”

Tony studied the statues a moment, squinting in the sun, before nodding. "Seems on brand.”

Pepper laughed. “Just don’t get ideas.”

"I can wait a while for statues.”

He didn’t build statues, but he loved putting his name on things. Stark Tower was probably the pinnacle of that. Though it wasn’t Stark Tower for very long. She looked over at him a moment. “You know, I was thinking we should sell the tower in Manhattan.” 

His brows went up, but he didn't seem as surprised as she'd expected. "And make the upstate compound our main base?”

“I think it already _is_ your main base. You don’t like going there. If had to guess I’d say it reminds you of too much. Stirs ghosts.” She could tell my the look on his face she’d been pretty close to the mark. “I wonder if it’s turning into an albatross.” 

“That’s not. . .off base. ”

They started hiking back up the beach. “Something to run past your therapist.”

“I have no idea how I’d explain that without telling her who I am.”

She looked up at him. “Maybe it’s time you did.” 

He looked heavenward. "Probably, yeah. I wanted to wait till we were home. But maybe that's not reasonable.”

“You are. . . unique,” she said, thinking that was probably an understatement.

He lifted a shoulder. "I'm discovering most of my issues are pretty common. They're causes are just weird.”

“I mean, you probably could fudge it; she knows you’re a wealthy man. You have a building you had built, you’ve got a better one now, why don’t you consolidate, etc. But I think it would be hard to explain the emotional impact without making things up.” The Avengers were probably easier to explain than JARVIS, but she was pretty sure JARVIS was the Tower’s most bothersome ghost.

"I'll give it some thought. Hopefully she's dealt with me enough to have formed her own opinion.”

“You’ll have some time to ponder. At our next stop, there’s no internet, and no cell towers.”

“My HUD glasses pull a sat signal,” he said immediately, like he couldn’t help it.

Pepper gave him a look. “Don’t make me confiscate them.”

"I'm only using them for touristy reasons.”

“I don’t think I want to know what that means.”

"Yelp reviews, secret gems. Things normal people use smart phones for.”

“We’re going to be on a private island in the tropics. You won’t need yelp.”

"I'm sure other people have been there.”

He loved to be pedantic when he knew she had a point. She rolled her eyes. “I’m going back to the jet.”

"Right behind you, dear.”

On the walk back, Tony got waylaid by Australian tourists who recognized him. Pepper waited while they took pictures and asked questions. He was a good sport about it, but all she could think was that he really never did truly get any time off. Iron Man followed him around the planet. The next stop would be a good one. There would be no tourists.

Then one of the Australians asked him if he knew where Captain America was, and there went the day’s good mood.

He spent half the flight staring out the window and another half typing on his laptop. It occurred to her that he should have brought some things to tinker with. He liked to do that when he was thinking.

Pepper dug out a book and hoped he wasn’t going to stew on this too long. Stewing brought out the Howard in him.

It was dark when they reached their island, amidst a coral atoll in French Polynesia. It was too small for an airstrip, but their jet could land nearly anywhere a helicopter could, so Tom put it down right on the beach, just to drop them off. He was going back to one of the larger islands to wait for them. 

“Nobody here but a handful of staff,” he told them as he lowered the back gate. “They’ve already been vetted.”

That seemed to brighten Tony's mood a bit, and he held her hand as they made it down to the sand. They stood back and waved for Tom to take off, then started walking towards the buildings.

He took a deep breath and sighed. "I do love salt air.”

There was a row of torches lining the path up from the beach, and they were met on it by a woman named Elodie, who introduced herself as their host and guide. “Your plane is very silent, you surprised me. Come, I’ll show you to your villa.”

Tony squeezed her hand a little as they walked and she hoped that was an indication the stewing was over. She knew Steve in particular was a sore point, another thing he should probably start being totally honest with his therapist about.

Their villa was just up the beach, in a traditional Polynesian style with a big thatched roof and little glass on the windows, at least in the living room. You couldn’t see the ocean too well, but you could certainly hear it. 

It was more rustic than your typical luxury resort—no plunge pool, no fancy spa, no marble bathrooms or designer decor. It didn’t even have a bellhop, and Tony was carrying their luggage, which was probably some kind of first. But the island had a private chef, housekeeping, and lots of water activities and a guide who could arrange to get or do whatever they wanted. 

What it had was peace, quiet, and _privacy_.

“We’ve got plenty of drinks and snacks for you in the kitchen,” Elodie was saying. “And something a little heartier in the warming drawer if you haven’t had much dinner. The chef will bring your breakfast in the morning. Would you like a set time or to call us?”

“We’ll call,” Pepper said, because Tony had wandered off to look at the bedroom. “We’ve hopped a lot timezones.”

“Of course. Just give us a half an hour warning. Would you like to eat your breakfast inside, on the lanai, or on the beach?”

“Lanai,” she said, because it sounded like the middle option.

“The phone is right there, it rings to the staff quarters, if you need anything.”

“Thank you,” Pepper said, and watched her let herself out.

She found Tony out on the lanai, looking out at the water. "Yeah, okay. If we can't relax here, it's just not happening.”

“I hope so.” She inhaled deeply. “It’s been a long day.”

"It has." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Privacy will be nice.”

She touched his arm. “You wanna come get something to eat?”

He nodded. "Food would probably improve my mood.”

There were two plates of what looked like dim sum in the ovens and she got a bottle of wine from the wine fridge under the counter. The lanai had a big two-person lounge chair and she sat on it so she could stretch her legs. “Come eat,” she called, because he was still staring at the ocean.

He made his way over to her and sat, accepting the wine glass she handed him. "Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” She ate some dumplings. “You want to talk about it?”

"I don't know. You know the basics. It's just. . . a wound.”

“Like a skinned knee that keeps bleeding every time you bend your leg too much?”

"Something like that, yeah." He popped a dumpling in his mouth and made an impressed face. "This is really good.”

“Isn’t it? Jess sent them a list of our food preferences.” She took a drink of her wine. “I know beach vacations are cliche, and we literally own a house in Hawaii, but I wanted us to be able to relax and really disconnect from the world.” Oahu was many lovely things, but disconnected wasn’t one of them.

"No, this is really nice. I'm a little burnt out on smiling for selfies.”

“Some food, some wine, good night’s sleep, and we’ll wake up in the morning in paradise.”

"How many days do we have here?”

“Five. Six if you count today. There’s another isolated and private stop like this in Mongolia, and one in I think Tanzania, which I’d guess is a safari. The rest of the stops involve being around people.”

He stretched and rolled his shoulders. "That's good. Longer than that and I'd probably get cabin fever.”

“There’s a lot to do here. There’s a whole booklet inside. But we can leave early if you’re bored.” Though she was looking forward to the relaxing.

"No, no. The point is to unwind. if I really get bored I'm sure my therapist will find me shit to work on.”

“There’s no internet,” she said. His face looked vaguely guilty, so she asked, “Rigged your satellite glasses to work with your computer, didn’t you?”

"In case of emergency. Or mental health needs.”

“No, I get it. It’s just very you. And I mean that fondly.” She drained her wine glass and said, “I don’t know what time it is, but I think it’s my bedtime.”

"You mind if I stay up a little longer?”

“As long as I’m not going to wake to find you bleary-eyed and disassembling the appliances at six AM.”

"I just want to send an email to Dr. Yee. Won't take more than an hour or so.”

“Okay.” She stood up, and bent to kiss the top of his head. “I love you.”

"I love you back," he said sincerely.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's a little late. These chapters require coding.

**I feel it’s only fair I tell you, I did figure out who you were pretty quickly. I know where Dr. Newbury works and it didn’t take long to guess which coworkers she was talking about. But I’m happy we’re all out in the open now. And you shouldn’t worry. You are not the most famous person I’ve ever treated, and I know public and private personas can be very different. Your filling in the details was very helpful. It’s always easier to do math when you have all the variables.**

Tony woke up in the morning to a reply to the novel he’d written to Dr. Yee, and some guy setting up a breakfast spread on the deck. There had been a chef mentioned last night, hadn’t there? Pepper was sitting out there in a gauzy sundress, drinking coffee.

He stood and stretched, wandering out to stand with her. “Morning."

“Hi,” she said. She lifted the plate cover off her food. “Crab Benedict. I got you one, too.” She pointed to a carafe. “And coffee.”

"Mmm, sounds great." He poured himself a cup. "What's on the agenda today?”

“I was thinking about laying on the beach, and maybe doing some snorkeling. We’ve been doing a lot of hiking and relaxing sounds nice.”

Exactly what he'd been thinking. "I have sat on a beach and just. . . read a book in years.”

“And don’t you think you deserve to do that?” she asked with a smile.

"I'm Tony Stark I deserve everything.”

She laughed. “Oh, good. You’re that version of you today.” Sounded like she meant it, too.

They finished their very delicious breakfast, and then took their dishes to the sink for housekeeping to take later. Pepper went to take a shower, and he opened up his laptop to answer Dr. Yee.

_Glad you enjoyed War & Peace. Looking at it, it sounds like it was made up by the writers of a late season TV show desperately trying to stave off cancelation. You’d probably think it was fake if the bullet points weren’t mostly publicly documented. Questions? Concerns? Literary feedback?_  
**You seem to be in a good mood, if you're willing to dredge all this up. Vacation working is charms on you?**  
_I’m on a deserted island. Literally. Pepper and I and there’s some staff on the other side of the island. But I got into it because I was in a bad mood, actually. Some tourist asked me about Steve Rogers and it ruined my day. The worst was the whole flight I could see Pepper bracing herself, like she was waiting for the entire trip to be ruined. That’s on me._  
**But instead of ruining it you sat down and wrote me? I think that's progress.**  
_I sent her to bed without me. Can’t tell if she’s upset or not._  
**Did she seem upset this morning?**

Before he could type a reply, Pepper came back out onto the deck in the bottom of a string bikini and nothing else. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her topless outside before—not even on the beach in someplace like St. Tropez where it was common. She was too afraid of being photographed.

While he stared at her, she held out a bottle of sunblock. “Can you put some on my back?”

"Be right there," he replied. Then typed quickly.

_Nope, definitely not upset. Talk to youlaterbye_. 

Then he got up and took the bottle, following Pepper out to the deck.

The sunblock was a very high SPF, which was good because she was very pale. She probably shouldn’t be nearly naked out in the tropical sun, but he wasn’t going to say that. The view was too nice. He put it on her very thoroughly, because a sunburn would not be any kind of fun. 

She made a contented humming noise. Definitely not mad.

"My therapist already figured out who I was," he told her as he rubbed her back.

She turned her head some. “You are kind of distinct.”

"Well, and she knew who Doc worked for.”

“You okay with that?”

"Yeah, I think so. Makes things easier.” 

He spread the sunblock down her lower back, and a little under the edges of her bikini bottoms. Bathing suits shifted and all. “Mmm,” she murmured. “I’m regretting doing the front myself.”

"So do I." He kissed her shoulder. "Maybe next time.”

She leaned back against him. “Feel like a swim?”

"Absolutely. Let me get my trunks on.”

With a smile she turned around to kiss him. “Meet me in the water.”

He gave her a squeeze, kissing her deeply, before jogging back into the cabin and digging through his stuff to find swim trunks. 

When he got back out there, Pepper was down in the lagoon. It was protected by a reef and had little waves, making it more swimming pool than ocean. You could also see the bottom as well as a pool, too. For a moment he just watched her standing in it waist high, until she turned and waved at him to come in.

Most of the time, Tony didn't believe in an afterlife. We had what we had here and the only immortality was the legacy you left behind. But _if_ there was a Heaven and if he got to it, he hoped it looked just like this.

They swam around in the lagoon for a while, loitered on the beach reading, napped in the hammock strung between two trees. The sunblock she was wearing was a particular kind that was safe for the coral reefs, but needed to be reapplied pretty frequently. He quite enjoyed helping with that. 

Lunch was delivered, along with snorkeling gear. They took a kayak out to the reef—she made him paddle—and they visited the fish. 

Afterwards, he dragged the kayak back up the beach and sat in one of the deck chairs while Pepper went to get some wine. She sat down next to him and handed him a glass. “I’m thinking this was a good idea,” she said.

"I am agreeing with you entirely." He reached over and clinked her glass with his. "I love you.”

She grinned. “I love you, back.” She drained her glass and stood back up, crossing her arms to pull the rash guard she’d worn snorkeling over her head.

"I love you a little more now.”

She laughed. “I need more lotion.”

He kissed her. "I will get right one that.” She waited for him, and maybe it was the wine but this sunblock application had a different tone to it. He could tell by her breathing even before her own hands began to wander.

Pressing gentle kisses to the back of her neck, he cupped and shaped her breasts, thumbs circling her nipples. He felt a full shudder pass through her, and then she lifted her arms so she could easily turn. She settled her hands on his shoulder, kissing him with an intensity that left no room for misunderstanding. When they paused for air, he asked, “You wanna go back inside?”

“No,” she said, so matter-of-factly that he looked at her in surprise. A smile curved her lips, and she added, “Sit.” It was _broad_ daylight.

Stunned, he sat in the deck chair with a thump, staring up at her like she was a goddess. She untied the bikini string on one side, and then the other. Maybe he had already died, and this was in fact the afterlife. Right now that was totally fine by him.

She crouched down and pulled down his swim trunks. He'd have helped her if he could move, but all he could do was stare at her, something she clearly found very amusing. By the time she bent her head and he felt her warm, wet mouth around him, he was already painfully hard. The visual was nearly as good as the feel. Her naked and the bright sunny beach beyond.

A second before it was too much she pulled back, standing up slowly enough he could reach out to touch her as she went, hands skimming over her sides. When they were on her hips she turned, sitting down in his lap and wiggling backwards. She braced her hands on the chair arms and he lifted her to help her take him inside. And for a moment, that was all there was.

"I wanted to enjoy the view," she whispered. She leaned back against him and began to rock her hips. 

The view of her body he could now see so nicely was much more entertaining, and he moved his hands over her abdomen, her breasts, her hips, her thighs. He used his legs to push hers further apart, fingers sliding down to find her clit. Her body jerked, and then she began rocking faster. She trailed her hand along his arm and then down to cover his hand between her legs. Then down lower, where they joined, and he could feel her fingers sliding along the underside of his cock as he moved in and out of her.

"If anybody came up this beach," she said, her voice as much a moan as anything, "They'd see absolutely everything."

Neither of them were particularly exhibitionist, but it was somehow one of the hottest things anyone had ever said to him, and that was a pretty high bar. It was all he could do to hang on a moment more. "You want to stop?" he ground out, knowing the answer.

"No, God no. Don't. . . don't. . ." She braced her hands on the arms of the chair and pushed back hard against him, taking him so deep he bottomed out. He could feel her whole body shake, and then she cried out as she came apart, and pulled him with her.

It took them a while afterwards to drag themselves back inside and sprawl out on top of the covers of their bed.

He laid there looking at the ceiling fan hanging from the beams and thinking about how in all his debauchery—and there was plenty—he’d been paranoid about three things, namely STDs, getting someone pregnant, and photographers. Ironic in hindsight, but she was the only woman he’d ever had completely unprotected sex with. Or, now, in a very visible place. “I don’t think I’ve ever done that before.”

“Really?” she sounded absolutely delighted.

"I have never before had the opportunity to have sex where I was one hundred percent sure there was no chance of getting photographed.”

“I just. . .didn’t know you had any firsts left. I’m rather proud of myself.

He chuckled. "That might be the last of them.”

She rolled over enough to kiss his cheek. “However, I think I have sunscreen in places no one should have sunscreen and am going to go hop in the shower. Call up an order our dinner.”

"As you wish," he said, giving her ass a pat.

He put shorts back on, called the chef, and then sat on the couch and opened his laptop.

**Good to know you guys are getting along. Though it’s worth noting that intimacy issues are pretty common after something like a miscarriage.**  
_Not a problem. So, so not a problem._  
**People go the other way, too. Use sex as an excuse not to talk.**

He frowned at the screen.

_Might be a problem._  
**Ah. Do you think that’s coming from her or from you?**  
_Maybe both? She's definitely initiated a few of our recent encounters. But we've also had a really long spell of not having time/inclination to be together. So I don't know how much is influenced by what._  
**Reconnecting can be very important, if you’ve had a gap. Just make sure you talk to her, too. The quiet afterwards is a great time to do that. She clearly gets you very well. For example, I think she’s right on the money about selling that building. You might find her read on a lot of things you don’t like talking about useful.**

This woman was worth twice what he paid her.

_I'll keep it in mind. The more I think about it, I do agree about the building. I don't enjoy being there. And I want to start over._  
**You may want to consider doing that in a way that you can spend less time on opposite sides of the country from each other.**  
_Definitely a goal_

Pepper came out from the bedroom, with damp hair and in the sundress from that morning. She saw what he was doing and waved. “I won’t disturb you,” she said. “I’m going to go lay in the hammock and read.”

"I'll be done in a few minutes and join you," he replied. 

“Take your time,” she called back.

**That’s my homework for you. Talk to her about something you don’t talk to her about.**  
_That sounds like really shitty homework._  
**You’re in paradise. I’m sure that will help.**

It did make things easier.

_I'll let you know how it goes._

*

This island had to be the most relaxing place on earth. Pepper couldn’t remember the last time she’d done so much nothing. She read entire books uninterrupted. They swam and snorkeled and took the kayak out. They went fishing, something neither of them knew how to do. Food materialized—including a delicious dinner made from the fish they’d caught. They napped in the hammock. They fooled around whenever and wherever they felt like it. 

“It’s like a honeymoon without wedding,” she commented to him one night.

"It really was." He was quiet a moment, playing with her hair. "Have you ever through about that?”

“Getting married?”

"Yeah. And the whole marriage thing afterwards.”

“I admit I kind of assumed we would at some point if I got pregnant. Though kids are more permanent than wedding vows anyway.”

"True." He shifted to look at her. "What about now that pregnant is off the table?”

She studied his face, wondering where this had come from. “You want an honest answer?”

"Just this once.”

“The day before I discovered I was pregnant, I had a meeting with a lawyer about how we’d go about disentangling our finances and shared assets. He told me that I was lucky we weren’t married because it would be so much harder.”

He didn't look thrilled, but neither did he look surprised. "That's a no, huh?”

“I’m just saying we were an inch away from being done not very long ago. We had a very ugly fight where we said some awful things. And a lot of those things were true, which is probably the best way to really hurt someone. I can’t imagine how bad a divorce might get.” 

"I'm not disagreeing. I know it's too early to think our problems are solved.”

“Why did you ask?”

He shrugged. "I realized we'd never really talked about it.”

Pepper sat up, but turned so she could look at him. “I am certain, down to my bones, that I will love you for the rest of my life. I’m less certain I’ll be able to live with you for all of that.”

That got a little chuckle. "Fair enough. And I can see that financially speaking, getting married presents more complications than benefits. But maybe we could look into some sort of paperwork linking us as each other's next of kin or something? I don't ever want to get thrown out of a hospital room because you're not my wife.”

That wasn’t at all where she’d imagined he was going with this, and she was genuinely surprised. “Yes. Of course. That’s actually a really good idea.”

"There's enough surprise in your voice I'm a little insulted.”

She lifted a shoulder. “I thought there would be more of a. . . possession angle to this topic, if I’m honest."

"I don't have that particular male ego thing, I guess. We don't need paperwork proving we're stuck with each other.”

“You’ve been getting weird about some things lately. I don’t know if it’s all that time spent on that neural interface with your own memories or what, but it worries me how much I see that seems like shades of your father.”

He tipped his head back. "I've been working on that with my therapist.”

“Is it helping?”

"It is. A lot.”

She reached out and rubbed his leg. “It's not a no. I promise. I'd like to have this conversation again.”

He curled his hand around hers. "I know. We have time to sort it out.”


	9. Chapter 9

They left the island in the morning, with a mix of reluctance, and excitement to do something a little more active. Pepper was pretty sure this was, officially, as relaxed as she’d ever been in her life. Privacy and peace had done them both a great deal of good.

They were in Australia after that. They went to the opera and a fancy party in Sydney, which was a very crowded and public experience. Then they were in a luxury camp in the Outback, where nobody bothered them. Tony didn’t even whine when she woke him up to watch the sun rise over Uluru.

“You know we came here when I was kid,” he commented. “I don’t think I was even ten. We climbed it, you could do that back then.”

“Yeah, it turns out that is super offensive to the aboriginals for whom it is sacred.”

“It was the ’70’s, people didn’t care back then. My Dad wanted to climb it, and I begged to come along. About three quarters of the way up, it got steep and I got scared.” He sighed. “He told me he knew he should have left me with the nanny—we traveled with a nanny—and then left me on the side of the rock while he completed his climb. He did promise not to tell my mother I’d been a chicken.”

Pepper stared at him. “Your father left a nine year old on the side of a mountain.”

"I suppose he figured I couldn't get into much trouble there. But yeah. I sat there an hour or two while he finished the climb and came back to get me.”

She chuckled. “You could make trouble—and some sort of rudimentary mechanical device—from the inside of a sensory deprivation tank.”

"I had created myself a sort of lean to and was halfway through a trebuchet.”

The chuckle became a full laugh. “I love you, I really do.” 

"I know. You must, to put up with me this long.”

She stretched her legs out, propping her ankles on the deck railing in front of her. “You’re good in bed, too. I’ll keep you.”

"I appreciate the sacrifice.”

“I’m sure you’ll make it worth my while.”

"Mmm." He leaned over and kissed her neck. "With all my skill.”

She hummed contentedly. “It is. You approach it like an engineer.” He had his hand on her thigh now. “A project to take apart.”

"And to constantly improve upon.”

“I have noticed that part, too.”

He grinned, looking quite proud. “Yeah?"

“It’s been the highlight of my trip,” she replied. “How about we go back inside?”

"And do some engineering?”

“Well, you know, I didn’t really let you bring anything to tinker with on this trip, so I feel bad.” 

He caught her hands and tugged at her to get her moving. "I think it was all part of your clever plan.”

She let him pull her up. “All my plans are clever.”

"That's true. That's why I love you.”

They killed most of the morning on engineering experiments. They were supposed to be doing some nature-y things that day but they told the guide they weren’t feeling up to it. He really did know how to absolutely take her apart.

Drifting with his head pillowed on her stomach, she ruffled his hair and asked, “Why is it like this?”

"The sex?" he asked.

“Yeah. I was thinking it was the island, but Peru wasn’t any different. Even Sydney. . .” He’d ripped the back seam of a $7,000 dress out of lack of patience with it’s buttons, and lifted her onto the suite’s dining table. 

"Maybe there's something to be said for chemistry," he said. "That we have always had, in one way or another.”

“So this is our natural state, without distractions?”

"Yep. Just fucking like bunnies.”

She sighed, stroking his hair again. “Maybe it’s a sign we need more time off.”

"Mmm, I think so. Or at least carve out alone time in our lives.”

They were quiet for a bit. “You know, sometimes I want to quit my job and go live on the vineyard full time.”

His brows went up and he shifted to look at her fully. "Do you want it in a nice day dream kind of way or a serious way?”

“Doesn’t really matter, you’d never quit yours. If I’m honest, for the greater good, I don’t even think you should.”

"I'm going to have to someday. I'm not Steve, I have no desire to die with my boots on.”

She swallowed. “I’ve always assumed you would. Want to or not. Every time you put that suit on, I wonder if it’s the last time I’ll ever see you. I have since the first time I saw it. Riddled with bullet holes.”

He sighed and rubbed her leg lightly. "I don't know the answer to that particular problem.”

“Maybe there isn’t one. It’s one of those things I’ve learned to live with. Price of being with you.”

"I feel like I have a lot of those. I'm expensive.”

He was matter of fact about it, but sounded a little sad just the same. She ran her fingertips down the side of his face. “You get what you pay for.”

A smile ghosted his lips. "So I'm cost efficient?”

She brushed her thumb over his mouth. “Just worth the price.”

The smile grew. "I'll take that.”

*

_Gobi, Mongolia_

They’d done some wandering through eastern Asia - Ankor Wat in Cambodia, temples is Thailand, cruise on the Yangtze River in China, visiting the Terracotta Army and taking a sidetrack to Beijing because the President of China wanted to meet with Tony, and that wasn’t an invitation to say no to.

They did get to go to a big fancy dinner, though. He managed to avoid ripping Pepper’s dress, which he was proud of. 

Now they were having one of their relaxation and privacy breaks. It wasn’t quite an island to themselves, but they were in a yurt in the high desert, at a fancy resort-camp that catered to people too rich to be impressed by him. That day they’d gone on a tour to hunt for dinosaur fossils. 

It was late, and Pepper was asleep. He was still up because it was daytime in the US, and he wanted to talk to Dr. Yee.

_So I’ve been thinking about Afghanistan._  
**The origin of your superhero story.**  
_It’s a great origin story, isn’t it? ‘Trapped in a cave, with no way out, Tony Stark builds the Iron Man armor and fights his way to safety.’_  
**In thumbnail, it sounds very heroic. I imagine in the moment it was terrifying.**  
_By the time I was building the damn thing, I was pretty calm and focused. I had a plan._  
**Get out or die trying?**  
_Blowing up’s not a bad way to go. Of all my near misses, those have been the least likely to keep me up at night. Much as they worry Pepper._  
**As far as death goes quick is better. Most people are more afraid of the suffering before hand than death itself.**  
_But once you’re in the midst of that kind of pain, dying looks like relief._  
**Yes is does. Because it promises an end to it.**

He stared into the darkness. It was pitch black, as they didn’t even have electricity. He was running off the day’s solar charge. It was also kind of cold to be outside, but he didn’t want to disturb Pepper with the light of the screen.

_The very first thing about the cave was the surgery that installed the electromagnet in my chest, so the shrapnel didn’t kill me. It was hooked up to a car battery. Yinsen didn’t have the best anesthesia._   
**You haven't told me much about Yinsen. Did you get to know him well in the cave?**  
_Well enough. He talked a lot about his family. Didn’t tell me they were already dead until he was dying. There’s a different kinds of pain death is a relief from, I guess. I’ll tell you my dirty secret. Terrorists wanted me to build them a missile, I said no, there was the expected torture… and then I gave up. Sat down and waited for them to kill me. Yinsen talked me out of it._

There was a pause before her answer appeared.

**There is no shame in hitting rock bottom. You went through trauma and pain most people can only imagine. What's important is that you listened to someone and found the strength the get up. Life isn't about how many times you fall down. It's about how many times you get up.**  
_He told me not to waste my life. Sometimes I wonder if that’s why I can’t stop._  
**Survivor's guilt can be very strong. But you don't owe him your life. I doubt he would want you to do that.**

For a long moment he started at the screen, before typing again.

_I think, if I could ask him, he’d tell me to marry Pepper and have some kids and spend my money on Doc’s research._  
**I think you're exactly right. Does that change the way you think about why you can't stop?**  
_Might have before the Avengers fell apart. I’m the only one left._

That wasn’t entirely true. If there was a catastrophic emergency, he could get ahold of Rogers.

**You've taken a lot on your shoulders I don't think you have to.**  
_I don’t technically have to do anything. I could go back to being a useless billionaire and merchant of death, and nobody could legally stop me._   
**Legally, no. Nor will anyone stop you from marrying Pepper and retiring while Amanda spends your money.**  
_Actually, technically, I think I’ve signed paperwork that says I am obligated to come if the UN calls._  
**That a lifetime agreement? No opt out feature?**

He sighed.

_No. I can retire if I want. Anyone can. Though the rest of them stayed retired for about 11 hours. I was pretty pissed at them for doing it, at the time, but I don’t know that my self control is any better. Steve told me when he saw a situation headed south he wished he could ignore it, and I told him that was bullshit. I know it, because I have the same problem._   
**So really, the only one keeping you in the superhero business is you.**  
_I would call that an accurate assessment._  
**Do you think it's punishment? Or a desire to be something greater than people expect you to be? Do you think you could find purpose in other pursuits? Perhaps training or funding other heroes?**  
_Huh. That’s not the worst idea. Training people. Like that spider kid. There have got to be more like him._  
**I would think there'd have to be. It would be a good outlet for you, and improve their chances of success.**  
_I want to be able to retire one day. Pepper thinks I’m going to die in the field. She’s just accepted it. Which is awful. And if I’m having children I want to be there to raise them._  
**Now is the time to be thinking of options. Of how to arrange your life so that retirement is possible. Putting your energy and focus into building up a new generation of heroes might be that path.**  
_You’re a really good shrink, you know that?_  
**That's what the little trophy on my mantle says.**  
_I need to give you a nice Christmas present. You want a porche?_  
**I'm quite happy with my current car, thank you. Your improvement is present enough.**  
_You think I’m improving?_  
**I do. You're more open to my suggestions and you're far more self-reflective.**  
_I’ve had a lot of time for reflection. A lot._  
**Vacations are good for that. When you get back, I recommend you start finding ways to disconnect from your routine and recharge without having to live in a yurt.**

Once his batteries had run out, Tony went back inside and undressed to get into bed. The bed was very comfortable, but very rustic. Camel hair blankets and all. It was so dark he couldn’t see her, but Pepper curled into him anyway.

He kissed the top of her head, taking in a breath of her scent. He could make this work. He could make this his world.


	10. Chapter 10

With the benefit of hindsight, Pepper really wished she’d gone on the pill before starting this vacation. Not for the usual reason one might regret not going on the pill, but quite the opposite. Because her period had started, and she was in a yurt in Mongolia.

And, despite it being completely ridiculous, and she knew it, she was crying. It had just floated in the back of her mind, in a way that she couldn’t quite turn off. About how it had happened once, and they had been having more sex than they had in years, and there was something magical about this entire trip. Which still should not have been an excuse for magical thinking.

Even a stopped clock was right twice a day. Didn’t make it good at telling time. She’d seen her numbers and his numbers. She wasn’t going to get pregnant without significant medical intervention and she damn well knew it.

And yet here she was, standing a rustic stone shower, wasting what was probably limited hot water, crying and hoping the shower hid the sound because this stupid yurt bathroom didn’t really have a door.

Eventually, even Tony knew when something was wrong as evidenced by the knock on the room divider. "Pep? You okay?”

“I’m fine,” she called. “Women things.”

"You need me to find chocolate?”

“We’re in the Gobi Desert. I don’t think they have chocolate.” Her voice cracked a little at the end.

There was a beat of silence, then he pushed the divider aside and came over to the shower. “Hey."

She turned the water off, and sniffled indelicately. “Sorry, I’m using all the water.”

"Yep, that's totally what I'm concerned about. Water consumption.”

“I assure you, what I’m crying about is no less stupid.” She reached for a woefully inadequate towel.

He stepped closer and rubbed her back. "Wanna talk about it?”

She shivered, and he produced a robe from somewhere to wrap around her. She leaned into him and he pulled her closer. “I think some small part of me hoped lightning might strike twice.”

"Ah." He hugged her tight, running his fingers through her hair. "That's not stupid.”

“Logically I absolutely knew. So it feels stupid. Futile hope is a really dangerous thing.”

"Maybe. But we can't always control our emotions.”

She pressed her face into his neck. “I want a big tub. Wine, chocolate, heat that’s not from a wood stove, TV, and room service.”

"I'll see it done.”

“I love you,” she replied. “I need to go dig through my bag.”

"All right. I'll go make some phone calls to get us out of here.”

Two hours later, Tom was setting the jet down on the field across from the yurts. Two hours after that, she was in a giant jetted tub in the fanciest hotel in Ulanbataar.

Tony poked his head in. "I just had all the wine and chocolate in the country delivered, would you like some here?”

“I would love some. Thank you.”

He disappeared, then returned with a tray of chocolates and brownies, as well as two glasses of wine. "Ta da.”

She smiled. He took good care of her. After sampling the candy and the wine, she said, “Chocolate’s pretty good.”

"Only pretty good? Should I call France and have them ship me something?”

Pepper laughed. “I believe you would.”

"For you? Absolutely.”

The hotel had a spa, and she spent the afternoon getting massages and wraps and various other things. She didn’t know what Tony did with himself, but when she got back up to their suite, he’d covered the dining table with parts of something he was tinkering with. They ate their room service dinner on the couch.

“Tomorrow we fly to India,” Pepper said. “Before going to the Taj Mahal, we’re stopping in New Delhi.” She laughed as she read the paper. “Apparently people love to invite you to weddings because you send presents even if you don’t know them. So, we’re attending one.”

He actually laughed. "So I don't get to crash it, but I do get to attend an Indian wedding.”

“Jess is very efficient.”

"She deserves a bonus for this trip.”

“I agree wholeheartedly.” She put her head on his shoulder. “Thank you.”

He kissed the top of her head. "I love you. I like taking care of you.”

They sat in companionable quiet for a bit. Then she said, “I don’t think I’d have been this upset if I didn’t still want to have a baby.”

Tony rubbed her back in little circles. "All right. I think I'm in a better place to try.”

She lifted her head to look at him. “Are you sure?”

"Yeah. I've been working with Dr. Yee a lot. She thinks I've improved. I want to try to step back from Iron Man-ing.”

“I don’t want to be discouraging, but you have said that before.”

He inclined his head. "Fair enough. But I've never had professional support before. And I've never had a plan.”

“Tapering yourself like an addiction?”

"Finding a new outlet. She suggested I start trying to train and support younger heroes.”

“Build a legacy to carry the torch? Not a bad idea.”

"That's what I thought. Gets me out of the field, but I can still feel I'm helping. Putting something good in the world.”

“Okay,” she said. “Lets look into it when we get home.”

"Okay." He squeezed her hand. "Thank you.”

They went to New Delhi in the morning. Pepper wasn’t feeling too great by the time they got there. Amanda had warned her her periods might be weird for a bit after the miscarriage, and this one was not disappointing. For several unpleasant definitions of ‘weird’. 

“So this wedding is actually the daughter of a big deal politician,” she told Tony as he fussed over her in their hotel room. “They’d be offended if you didn’t go.”

"I feel bad going without you, though. But I don't want you to be miserable.” 

“I’m mostly disappointed about the sari,” she replied. Indian formalwear had been delivered to the hotel for them, for this particular event. Hers was gorgeous and she was genuinely sad not to put it on. 

"Want me to bring you back anything?”

“No. Don’t cause an international incident, and we’ll be fine.”

He gave her a little salute. "Aye aye boss.”

Pepper napped for a while, and felt better when she woke up. She ordered some room service, and was eating it when Tony got back.

“No international incidents, but that kid is giving me an ulcer.”

She blew on her chana masala. “Kid?”

“Parker.” He flopped on the couch. “He’s managed to fumble his way into what I _think_ is a group of arms traders selling alien tech. A lot of stuff was ‘liberated’ when SHIELD fell. I had to send a suit to go fish him out of a lake.” He looked at his watch. “I need to call the FBI.”

Pepper offered him a piece of naan. “Told you he was too young.”

“He’s got powers and he was using them, supervised or unsupervised. Might as well be supervised.”

“Circling back to our conversation the other day. . . maybe he needs genuine supervision and not just intermittent remote monitoring or whatever you’re doing.”

He sighed and tipped his head back. "Yeah, probably. Happy's trying, but he's also busy packing up the Tower.”

“End of an era,” she said with a smile. 

"It is," he agreed. "I feel like we should go look at it empty. Have a sitcom moment.”

She sighed heavily. “Is it getting on time to go home?”

"It might be. We've been away a long time. But I'm not opposed to another stop or two along the way.”

“You did have that. . . driving in Italy thing on your list.”

He smiled and nodded. "Let's see if Jess can get us a villa and a convertible.”

*

They went to the Taj Mahal, and then flew to Salerno. It was warm and sunny and they had a convertible and a warm Mediterranean to swim in. Pepper had on sandals and a halter dress that had no back, and they had nothing to do but drive around.

And be bothered by FRIDAY. “Boss, we may have a problem.”

He took a fortifying breath. "What kind of problem?”

“Mr. Parker has hacked into his suit and disabled the Training Wheels Protocol.”

"Are you kidding me? Has he hurt himself or others?”

He could see Pepper’s eyebrows go up, and he mouthed, _Parker_ at her. “He hasn’t left his hotel room,” FRIDAY said. “He’s on a school trip.”

Well, how much trouble could he get into there. "Okay. Well. Keep me posted. I'll check in on him when we stop.”

Peter didn’t answer when he called, but FRIDAY reminded him it was the middle of the night in the US. He’d call the kid and yell at him tomorrow.

They spent the day driving and wandering, stopping for food or shopping or a little trip to the beach. They had dinner at some little street-side cafe, and lingered over coffee. 

"These have been the best weeks of my adult life.”

She smiled. “Me too.” She hooked her foot around the back of his ankle under the table. “Would now be a good time to mention my lady things are over.” She paused. “Over enough for hotel sheets, anyway.”

He laughed. "This is an excellent time to mention that. We should get a little more vacation nookie under our belts.”

She bit her lip, held his eyes, and nodded her head toward the street. “Get the check.”

To hell with that. He dumped a hundred euros on the table for meal that couldn’t have been more than 40. They’d sort it out. He stood and pulled her up and they kissed right there on the sidewalk.

Anywhere other than Italy, it probably would have gotten them arrested. And by the time he broke the kiss to drag her to the car he was seriously considering just springing for a closer hotel room.

Their hotel did have valet, which meant he could just leave the car. He pulled her into the elevator and managed to keep his hands to himself until the door closed. Though it was a near thing. Her back was entirely bare, and he ran his fingers up her spine. “Reminds me of that dress.”

“Mmm?” she hummed, leaning in to kiss him.

“After Afghanistan. There was a party. You had on a backless dress and we almost kissed.” Something had simmered, just a little, between them from the beginning, to be studiously ignored. She’d drifted into his dreams in the cave. But that night was the first time he wanted her, and he hadn’t wanted anyone else since.

“Ah, yes. The time you went to get me a drink and left me on the roof.”

He ignored the dig. "Martini, too many olives and very dry.”

She laughed, and sighed as he kissed her neck. “The things you remember.” 

The elevator doors opened and he danced her out into the hallway, then down to their room door. "Remembering a lady's drink order is important.”

He still had his HUD glasses on, because they were also his sunglasses and he was more interesting in untying the neck of Pepper’s dress than taking them off. So he could help but see when FRIDAY started flashing for his attention. For a moment he seriously considered just tossing them.

“I’m sorry, boss, but you told me to tell you if Mr. Parker was up to anything.”

God, he was gonna kill that kid. "What is he doing?" he asked, still mostly focused on the knot.

“Scaling the Washington Monument. His tracker says he’s still at his hotel. But I’ve got a video feed. There’s been some sort of explosion.” Said video feed was immediately displayed in his view. All you could really see was police helicopters hovering around the monument.

Then there was a shot of him leaping over one of the helicopters and then swinging off the it’s landing feet to propel himself through a window. That was. . . actually a pretty cool move.

His hands paused on the dress. "Shit. Is this on the news?”

“It is,” FRIDAY said. Pepper extricated herself from his arms. 

He sighed deeply. "Thanks, FRIDAY." He looked at Pepper. "I'm sorry. Parker's on the news.”

They put it on the suite’s television and sat on the couch to watch the feed. It turned out he had rescued his friends—the kids he was on the class trip with—from an elevator failure. Aside from the fact that it was a very public place, and that he’d hacked the suit, it was actually the kind of thing Tony wanted him to do. Elevator failures were different from arms dealers.

Pepper sighed. “You need to actually supervise him. If he’s going to be doing this stuff, he’s going to need to, like, sign the Accords. And be on our liability insurance. People are going to come looking for him.”

"I know, I know. You're right. He's clearly not going to be able to keep a low profile." Especially not dressed like a patriotic spider themed wrestler.

“Training wouldn’t do him harm, either.”

“FRIDAY, pull up the baby monitor footage. I want to see what he’s been up to.”

They watched a scan through the time he’d worn the suit that weekend, which turned up another attempt to disrupt a weapons deal, getting locked in and breaking out of a storage facility, and accidentally detonating a Chitari explosive core, that he’d somehow found, inside the Washington Monument. Which he then had to rescue people from.

“Yeah,” Tony said. “Liability insurance.”

“I’m going to call Tom,” Pepper said, sounding resigned. “Get the jet ready. We should get back before he makes more trouble.” 

He rubbed her back. "I'm sorry, Pep.”

She kissed his cheek, and said, “You owe me an Italy do-over.” Then she stood up, and he watched her and her backless dress walk across the room.

He stewed for a bit on the flight home, and then got to work. If Peter was going to be an Avenger, then it was definitely time for Mark II of his suit. The last one had been built pretty hastily. Pepper slept, but he did not.

They landed at the Tower, which nearly completely packed up. It was jarring to see it so empty. Reminded him of when it was first being built. Or, remodeled after the Battle of New York to accommodate the team.

It stirred memories of things and roads he didn’t want to look down.

“Why don’t we go get some brunch? Pepper asked, clearly sensing his mood.

“I have to go talk to the kid.”

“Why don’t you call him first instead of just showing up in his living room? And then we can eat.”

Tony sighed. “Not the worst idea. FRIDAY? Get the kid on the line.”

Pepper patted his arm. “Don’t be a jerk to him. You gave a fifteen year old a hot rod. Of course he drove it around.”

She wasn’t wrong. He remembered being that age.

“Connecting,” FRIDAY said, and then the line opened, with a lot of wind.

“Mr. Parker. Got a sec?”

“Uhhh. I’m actually at school.” That was amazingly guilty sounding for a single sentence. Probably because he knew he’d hacked the suit and blew up a national monument and was expecting to get yelled at.

Tony could feel Pepper looking at him. “Nice work in DC,” he said, ignoring for a second the fact that he’d caused it. Tony blew up a lot of things at that age, and he could still remember the dismissive, bitting sarcasm in his father’s voice when he’d commented on it. “You know, my Dad never gave me a lot of support, so I’m trying to break the cycle of shame.”

“I’m kind of in the middle of something right now!”

Was this kid for real? And he wanted to have some of these of his own. “Don’t cut me off when I’m complimenting you. Anyway, great things about to ha-” There was a sound not unlike a foghorn. “What is that?” he asked. Even thought it was clearly a fog horn.

“Uh, I’m at band practice.”

He looked over at Pepper, and her eyebrows were up. Okay, even she thought this was fishy. “That’s odd. Happy said you quit band six weeks ago. What’s up?”

“I gotta go. End call.”

“Hey!” But the line went dead.

Feeling about a hundred years old, he asked, “FRIDAY, where is he?”

“The tracker is still disabled.”

“Trace the phone call.”

There was a pause, then FRIDAY said, “He’s in the Upper Bay near the Ellis Island.”

It took a moment to parse that and the fog horn. “Is he on one of the ferries?”

Beside him, Pepper laughed. “Maybe he’s going to climb the Statue of Liberty. Tour all the monuments.”

“God.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Let’s get some food and then I’ll go deal with him.”

They got exactly one block, before FRIDAY cut in. “Boss, I’ve just picked up a message, the FBI calling the NYPD for helicopter support and a bomb squad on the Staten Island Ferry.”

"God fucking dammit," he said, loud enough to get a couple glances from passerby. "He's going to get himself killed.”

Pepper sighed. “Do you have a suit at the tower?”

Hoping this wasn't going to get him in trouble, he nodded. "Yes. A model or two old.”

“Go,” she said. “You’ll never forgive yourself if he dies.”

He kissed her cheek. "Thank you. I love you. FRIDAY, bring me my suit.”


	11. Chapter 11

Pepper got herself some lunch, and then went back to the Tower. She didn’t know how long Tony would be, but wanted to wait for him before going back upstate. Everything was boxed, but the larger pieces of furniture were still in place. The AV systems still worked, so she could put on the news and watch Tony tape an entire ferry back together. She hoped the kid was okay.

Tony called her a little while later. “I have go talk to the kid now,” he said. His temper sounded riled, but she didn’t entirely blame him.

“Good luck,” she told him. “I’m going to order Chinese food for dinner. I’ll save you some potstickers.”

"Thanks." He disconnected abruptly. She kind of wasn't looking forward to him coming home if he was in that kind of mood.

He appeared on the balcony around the time her food arrived. The suit disassembled to let him out and he stormed inside, throwing what looked like the kid's spider suit onto the couch next to her.

She looked at it, alarmed. “Is he okay?”

"He's fine. But only because I showed up in the nick of time.”

And he was clearly still pissed off about that. “Did he damage the suit?”

"I don't think so." He was pacing. "I made him give it back. He obviously can't handle it.”

“Are you going to train him how to use it?”

"Not till he proves he's worth it." He gestured at the suit. "He told me he was nothing without it. So maybe he wasn't what I thought he was.”

She stared at him. “I’m sorry, what?”

"This is more than taking a hot rod for a spin, This was causing a six car pile up. On a ferry.” It was that. . .tone of his. The condescending sarcasm he deployed when he felt like he was the king of the universe. The same voice that had tried to blame her for the time limit on her own reproductive system, and ‘joked’ about how easily he could find a new model.

Riled now herself, she put her hands on her hips. “Because you gave him the car and didn’t teach him how to drive.”

"I told him not to do this. I told him I'd handle it. And he tries to take down a gun running ring on his own.”

She watched him stalk over to the bar and rifle through the boxes. “Which is exactly what you would have done.”

"I'm an adult. I told him to stick to helping old ladies across the street and going to goddamed school.”

“That’s what I’m saying. You’re an adult, and you don’t have that kind of self control. How many times have you meddled in things someone told you not to? He’s fifteen. Of course he took the bait.”

He gave up on the boxes, throwing his hands up in the air. "He should have listened to me! If he won't listen to me then why should I bother with him?”

Pepper stared at him. “Jesus, do you hear yourself?” She’d only seen a scattering of videos and scenes from his memory interface device, but it was enough notice how _very_ much he sounded like his father right now. “He’s not worth it? Why bother? Is that what matters most to you? Obedience?”

His mouth opened and closed. "No, but in this case he should have known to listen to me.”

“Why, because you’re always right?”

"I didn't say always, but usually-“

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she burst out, cutting him off. “How about you tone down the self righteous a little bit? You make plenty of mistakes.”

"And I want him to do better!”

“And because he didn’t, you took his suit away.”

“Yes!"

She stared him down. “I think that is the most Howard thing I have ever seen you do.”

He actually took a step back with his hand on his chest, and she didn't think it was melodramatics. Of all the soft spots he had, that was probably the worst. “Pepper."

For a moment she felt bad, but it was _true_. It reared its ugly head every time they had a fight. So she crossed her arms over her chest. “Seriously, listen to yourself. Your voice, your language, the cold punishment for not reaching impossible expectations. He’s not worth your time. There is perfection, and there is failure. And failure is a character flaw.”

"When failure means getting killed, then yes, it is unacceptable.”

She tipped her head back and looked at the ceiling. “He’s a kid, Tony. They fail sometimes. Sometimes badly. You catch them, you pick them up, you help them fix it.” She looked back at him. “You don’t cut them off and cast them out. With a big heap of indignant to cover the fact that you fucked up just as bad.”

"Well what was I supposed to do? How is he supposed to learn anything?”

“Not that! Did you ever learn anything from getting your Christmas presents thrown away?” Howard had taken things from Tony when he was mad—and not in a “lose your privileges” kind of way. He’d tell his son he didn’t deserve it and get rid of it permanently. The stories Pepper had heard ran the gamut from understandable—taking his tools after setting the garage on fire—to uncomfortable—not letting him come home from boarding school for the holidays for an infraction Tony no longer remembered—to the horrifying, such as the time when he was very small he was made to throw his favorite stuffed animal down the trash chute. “Other than that your father was an asshole?”

He crossed his arms and breathed deeply a moment. "This is different.”

She watched him, unable to decide if she felt more sad or angry. “No, it’s not. He disappointed you, so you hurt him.”

A few more deep breaths. "What do you want me to say?”

There wasn’t any point if he was digging in his heels. “Nothing.” She put her hands over her eyes. “Nothing at all. I just. . . are you going to be like this with our children? Your mother might have turned a blind eye but I damn sure won’t.”

"I don't intend for our kids to be superheroes." When he refused to engage with the actual problem, he knew he was wrong but still wasn't ready to back down.

She felt weariness seep into her bones. There had been something magical when they were traveling, but now they were home, and they were back to this. “For the record. The only acceptable answer to that question was a resounding no.” She went over to grab her bag. “I’m going to a hotel.”

He looked flummoxed. "You're what? You're leaving?"

“This fight is about to devolve into something ugly and I-I am not up to it.”

His mouth opened and closed a couple times, then he shook his head. "We were doing so well," he said quietly, mostly to himself.

“Yeah,” she replied, feeling a lump form in her throat. “Two steps forward, one step back.” She swallowed. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

He nodded but didn't look at her. “Okay." She hesitated a moment, and then left. 

*

Tony hadn’t written Dr. Yee in a while, long enough she’d sent him a gentle check-in message. He stared at it for the longest time, sitting in the Tower in the dark, before he replied.

_Do you ever see people in person?_  
**I do. I have several local clients.**  
_Sometimes it’s nice to talk and not type._  
**Do you need to come for a visit?**

He tapped the side of his computer for a moment.

_Pepper and I had a fight and she went to a hotel by herself._  
**Ouch. What was the fight about?**  
_I think something other than what I thought it was about._  
**Yeah. That can happen. Well, the weekend is coming up. I'd be up for a house guest.**  
_Where do you live, anyway?_  
**Just outside San Francisco. Near Silicon Valley.**  
_I think that’s probably driving distance from my vineyard. I’ll fly out there and drive up. I’ll be there in the morning._  
**I'll send you my address.**

He probably should have slept rather than fly somewhere, but the suit had taken him places while completely unconscious, and anyway he didn’t feel like sitting around in the swamp of memories that was the tower.

The vineyard, as it turned out, was not a whole lot better, memory-wise (or sleep-wise). But it did have a stocked workshop, so he could occupy himself. He could have just flown up in the suit, but he thought the drive might do him good. Even if the garage at the vineyard only had back-up cars in it. 

He took Highway 1 up as far as he could, so he could enjoy the ocean air and view. When he hit Santa Cruz, he veered inland on the slowest highway in the world and made his way northward to his doctor's house in Palo Alto, near Stanford University.

It was a one story mission style house with an orange tree in the front yard and no grass. It was lunchtime, and he'd told her he'd be there by one, so he climbed out of the car and rang the bell.

A few moments later it was opened to reveal a petite Asian woman in a mint colored blouse and black slacks. She was sitting in a wheelchair.

Tony blinked a her for what felt like forever, then managed to say, "You're not what I pictured."  
She smiled. "Most people think I should have glasses.”

“You want a pair of robotic legs?” he asked as she ushered him in. “I’ve built six different versions of them.”

"No, thank you. I wouldn't say no to a hover chair, thought. Would you like something to drink or some snacks?”

“Coffee would be a good idea. I’ve been awake. . .a while.”

"Come with me, we can start talking while it brews.” 

He shoved his hands in his pockets and strolled after her. “Did you by some chance see the thing with the ferry on TV?”

"It was hard to miss," she told him, portioning out coffee grounds into a very fancy looking coffee maker. "You looked like you had someone with you?”

“That was Peter Parker, the spider kid. He went to try and stop a weapons deal and somehow cut the ferry in half. I had to go bail him out.”

There must have been something in his tone because she looked over at him. "You were displeased with that.”

“Yeah, he almost got himself and a bunch of other people killed. I told him to stay away from it and he completely ignored me.” He sat at her kitchen table. “It’s dumb luck I was there in time.”

She made a little noise that wasn't quite agreement, but was probably to indicate she was listening. "Did you have a chance to talk to him about his actions afterwards?”

“Yeah, and I took his suit away. Which, unbelievably, is what Pepper is mad about.”

Her brows went up. "You took his suit away? For how long?”

“I don’t know. I told him forever, but that’s probably. . .not true. “

"Mmm. Well, we can come back to that. You said you had a fight that was really about something else. So what do you think the underlying issues was? Cream and sugar?”

“Black.” He waited until she brought the cup of coffee over before answering the other question. “And I think it’s that I’m my father’s son.” 

"Your treatment of Peter was reminiscent of how your father used to treat you?”

Man, did he not want to admit that. It was probably the worst thing Pepper had said. And yet. . . “I could hear his voice coming out of my mouth.”

She smiled a little. "You'd be amazed how often I hear that from men like you. Shitty dads seems to be trend in CEOs.”

“I think even Pepper had a shitty dad.” He sighed heavily. “Growing up I felt like just another one of his products. One he was disappointed with.” 

"I get the sense he was a perfectionist. Failure wasn't an option?”

“Nope. He was perfect, and so should everyone else be.” He held up his cup. “This is pretty good. Once, he recorded a video message telling me I was his greatest creation and the key to the future. I found it long after he died. While alive his greatest creation was Steve Rogers. That was the standard. Rarely did I ever measure up.” 

"It's Hawaiian coffee, it's better than pretty good." She sipped her own cup. "So there's a lot to unpack there, but we'll try to focus on your father. His name was Howard?" He nodded. "Are you still trying to impress Howard?”

“You can’t impress a dead guy, Yee.”

"That wasn't technically an answer.”

“I’m not Iron Man to impress my father. This is not some sort of Daddy Doesn’t Love Me thing. Apparently he did at some point. And I had to watch a video of him being murdered, so. . .” He waved a hand. “I don’t want to get into that right now.”

She inclined her head. "All right. Let's circle back to the fight with Pepper. She was upset with how you treated Peter and compared it to your father's parenting style. Did she relate this to how you might parent your children someday?”

“She asked me if I would be like that with our kids. And I. . . didn’t really answer.”

"The way you treat a teenager you're mentoring isn't necessarily how you'll treat a child you're raising. But it is a valid concern. We tend to mimic the behaviors we've grown up seeing.”

“I think I couldn’t answer her because the answer is yes. I won’t want to, but clearly I will.”

"You probably will, sometimes. But there are ways to unlearn that behavior. People break cycles of abuse, all the time.”

“She doesn’t seem inclined to give me a chance to do so. I say one wrong thing and she leaves.” 

"Do you really think she left because of that? Or maybe did she feel the fight wasn't getting you anywhere?”

“That’s probably true. But I don’t think that’s cause to go to a hotel.” Of course, they’d planned to drive up to the compound that evening. If she didn’t want to sleep in the tower, which was probably being loaded into moving trucks right now, and she didn’t want to spend two hours in the car with him, that was her only option. She couldn’t just go downstairs.

"She may have felt she needed space to think. Or wanted to give you space to do the same." Yee folded her hands in front of her. "All couples argue, it's just another way of having a conversation. But there's a right way to do it, and if you were refusing to answer her, or were digging in your heels even if you know you were wrong, then stepping back and taking a break is the right choice.”

He looked up at her a long moment. “Honestly, I’d probably deserve it if she did leave. I deserved it the last time, and probably many other times she hasn’t left.”

"Maybe you do," she conceded. "But life isn't always about deserve. And Pepper seems to think you deserve a chance.”

“She is like the dead opposite of my father. He gave no second chances. Pepper always does. not blindly, I have generally have to earn it, but. . .” He turned his mug around in circles. “No wonder she was so pissed I wouldn’t give one to Parker.” 

Yee smiled, and he got the feeling he'd passed a test. Or had a breakthrough or something. "Do you want to be the kind of person that gives more chances?”

“Seems a better way to be, doesn’t it?”

"I think so. At least on a general basis.”

He rubbed his eyes. “Do you have more coffee?”

"I do." She rolled away from the table. "And I'll make you some lunch.”

“And talk about your hover chair?”

"If you want.”


	12. Chapter 12

Dr. Yee made sandwiches, and found him a dry-erase marker to sketch things on her sliding glass door. Tony thought better while he worked, like he had to distract his higher brain functions to process things. “Stabilizing this thing without you using your hands is going to be interesting. How far off the ground do you think you need to be?”

"To be honest it would be nice to be able to change. Because my house is designed for me to be in the chair, but the rest of the world isn't." She watched him draw. "Do you think your reaction to Peter was based in anger or fear?”

He gave that a moment of thought. “Anger caused by fear? I think?” He sighed. “Pepper told me I gave a teenager a hot rod and shouldn’t be surprised he drove it into a tree.”

"That's an apt metaphor. Often parents will lash out in fear, or anger at themselves. Seeing someone you're responsible for have a near miss is scary.”

“Parenting in general is scary.”

"It is. There's no instruction manual and every day is a challenge. Everyone fucks it up.”

“Pepper wants to. Do the whole medical process to try again. Or whatever other alternates come after that."

"Is that what you want?”

“I am not enthused about the process,” he said. “But I want a family. Whether I admitted it or not, I always have.” 

"That's something. The family is a lot more permanent than the process getting it.”

“Yinsen asked me if I had a family. I said no, and he told me I have everything but nothing. Took me a while to understand that.” He looked back at her. “And to appreciate who I did have.”

She smiled. "For what it's worth, I still think you've made progress. You will not become the perfect partner overnight.”

“You think I’ll screw up my theoretical kids?”

"I think everyone screws up their kids. What matters is if you try to mitigate those screw ups but improving yourself and supporting your kids. And I think you will do that. And you can start learning how by how you treat Pepper and Peter.”

“Sounds fair,” he said. His own writing was blurring in front his eyes. “Don’t suppose you have someplace I could catch a catnap. I haven’t slept since Italy.”

"I have a guest room you're welcome to." She lead him down the hall to a cozy room with a queen bed that clearly doubled as an office. It was probably weird to take a nap at your therapist’s house, but he was too tired to care.

"Get some rest," she told him. "Come find me when you get up.”

A couple hours of sleep did him wonders. Pepper had called while he was asleep, but hadn’t left a message. When he called her back, he got her voicemail.

"Hi," he said. "I'm in California. At my shrink's house, actually. But I'm okay and. . . you know, would like to talk. If you want to talk. Maybe we could both talk with her. I don't know. Anyway. Hope you're okay. Bye."

He stared at the phone a moment, then got up and ventured back into the house. Maybe Yee had a wet bar.

He found her on the back porch, in the late afternoon sun, reading a book. She smiled when he came out. "You look better.”

“Sleep is a good thing. Sorry to crash your Saturday."

"It's all right. I didn't have any plans." She gestured to the chair next to her. "Sit, enjoy the breeze."

He did so, taking a deep breath of the flower scented breathe. He was happy she gave him a few minutes to just sit and be silent.

"Pepper called while I was asleep," he said finally. "Didn't leave a message. I called back and told her voice mail where I was."

"Calling you is a good sign.”

“I should talk to her in person, shouldn’t I?”

"I always recommend it, if possible. You have a lot to talk about.”

“I have to drive back down to the vineyard to get my suit to fly home.” He now regretted not bringing it. And it was an old one, not one he could call remotely.

"Do you feel up to doing that?”

“I need to, my suit is down there.”

"I know, but if you're not up for driving I can take you down.”

He probably really shouldn’t be driving. Particularly in the dark, which it would get before he got there. “It’s a 3 hour drive. Also it was built in 1926 and might get some award for how aggressively _un_ accessible it is.”

She laughed. "Why don't you wait until the morning and drive fresh?”

“Are you sure that’s not weird?”

"I'll take you off the clock. It'll just be an awkward acquaintance thing.”

He smiled. “Can I buy you a nice dinner?”

"I'd be just fine with that.”

When he asked her where she wanted to go, she requested somewhere no one could ever get reservations for. He liked her a little bit more just for her willingness to mildly abuse his fame. It only took a couple of calls, and they had themselves a nice table at a Michelin three-star resteraunt in San Francisco.

"This feels like a suitable trade for my hospitality," she said as they perused the wine list.

He chuckled. “It is. The chair will be for your work towards unfucking my head.”

"That will certainly be the most unique gift I've gotten from a client.”

“I’m doing a lot of medical things lately. I made the legs for Rhodey. Now I’ve got the chair. And I’ve been working on something for Newbury. Portable medical equipment kit, like the stuff they have in an ambulance, powered by an arc reactor. It’s heavy as hell, though.” He pointed at her. “The hover set up on your chair is how I’ll move it. That’s a good idea.”

"Glad to help." She reached for the bread basket. "Have you thought about what you want to say to Pepper?”

“No. Not really. I’m hoping the sleep will help with that.”

"It has a tendency to clear the head. You should also base some of it on what she has to say to you.”

“She hasn’t called me back. I don’t know if that’s a sign that she’s still mad.”

She shook a finger at him. "You don't know what else she might be doing. Maybe she's giving you space since you said you were with me.”

He held up his hands. “I’m just going to go home and take it as it comes.”

"That's probably your best strategy.”

“Thanks for talking me out of driving. It would have been too late to fly home, and I don’t want to sleep in that house.”

She inclined her head. "I have a good idea, now and then.”

He felt a ton better in the morning, after an actual good night’s sleep. He drove back down south, figuring he’d forage in the non-perishables from the pantry for some lunch, and then fly back east. He didn’t know how worried he should be that Pepper hadn’t called him. Even if Yee told him not to worry. It was the kind of thing that couldn’t be helped.

Pulling up the drive towards the garage, he noticed it. The windows were open.

*

Pepper’s favorite place on the vineyard was out in the gardens beyond the house. Someone had built a big pergola and trained star jasmine over it, and underneath was a swing, so big you stretch out and lay on it. She’d always thought it would be a nice place to take a nap, and would lay out there and read when they were having one of their weekends. 

Tony hated it and probably would have had it taken down if left to his own devices. The rustic-ness of the house was already a little out of his comfort zone. In his eyes, this thing was a nest of spiders, splinters, and dirt. He climbed up there anyway to check the structural integrity of the wood and tighten the bolts. and got a bee sting for his trouble. He hadn’t gone near it since.

Which is why she was started to wake up from her nap in it to find him standing there leaning against one of the posts.

"Hey," he said quietly. "I didn't expect you to come out here.”

She sat, tucking her legs up. “FRIDAY said you were here.”

"I went to see Dr. Yee in person.”

“I got your message. By the time I did, I was already here, so I thought I’d just wait.” 

"I stayed at her place. I was too tired to drive and didn't really want to spend the night here alone.”

She fiddled with the blanket. “You said you wanted to talk?”

"Yeah." He blew out a breath, shoving his hands in his pockets. "You were right, I handled the Parker thing exactly the way my dad used to handle me. My only excuse is that I think mine was from a place of fear and guilt and not. . . whatever the fuck was wrong with Howard.”

“You know, he probably absorbed a whole lot of radiation over the course of his life.”

He smirked. "Good a theory as any. Anyway, I'm still working on what I want to do to fix things with him, but first I want to fix things with you. I'm going to keep fucking up, but I also want to keep trying to fix it. Until maybe the fuck ups get smaller and farther apart.”

She patted the swing’s cushion next to her. “Come here.”

Pushing off the post, he walked over and joined her on the swing, glancing up suspiciously. 

“I haven’t seen a single bee. Or spider.” He turned and made a face, which got her to chuckle. Then she reached and put her hand on his arm. “I didn’t think we’d talk about this. I thought some time would pass, tempers would cool, and we’d just go on. Like we’d done with a hundred other fights. The thing is. . . I don’t need you to never fuck up. That’s not realistic—it’s not even humane. But I do need you to admit it. To learn how to be wrong. And to do it before I am too emotionally exhausted to talk about it anymore, and without me having to do something drastic like leave.”

He nodded. "I think I'm getting better at that. I also think I do better talking to my shrink in person. She also suggested you come in for a few sessions.”

“I would sincerely love to meet this woman.”

"I already bought her a nice dinner. And I'm building her a hover chair!”

“That sounds like an excellent project.” She rubbed his arm and sighed. “One thing I was thinking about. . . I think your father didn’t really like children. Even if he wanted progeny I don’t think he wanted the chaos and needs and disruption they cause when little. You irritated the shit out of him before you were even old enough to form memories, and never forgave you because he didn’t do forgiveness.”

He seemed to consider that a moment. "I do generally like children. And I'm a lot more. . . aware of the problems they cause? If that makes sense? He didn't realize his life would have to change.”

“Maybe that was a luxury of his time. And he certainly never had to examine his own flaws.”

"No," he said with a bitter laugh. "Not ever.”

“Without Afghanistan, you’d probably have been just like him.”

"Yee calls that my origin story. I think she's right. I had to change who I was or die.”

“I think in a way you did. Die. The guy who made me come over at 7AM to to evict his one night stand from the house while he hid in the basement? That guy wouldn’t have tolerated a toddler underfoot either. But he died in that cave. I fell in love with the new guy.”

He smiled and gave her a look that was almost shy. "Present tense?”

Nothing got her quite like when she could see the cracks in his bravado. And when she could most clearly see the parts of him that were entirely hers. She leaned forward to kiss him. “Future tense, too.”

He tucked his arms around her, kissing her gently. "I love you. I don't deserve you, but I love you.”

“Answer me honestly. Do you really want to have a baby?”

"I do," he said. "I want a family.”

“It may be hard. Lots of doctors appointments and shots and I _need_ you to follow their instructions. It may not work and we may have to discuss other options. I need to not do it alone.” She didn’t expect the sudden lump in her throat and catch in her voice.

"I'm not looking forward to it," he said. "And I hate that I can't invent something to fix it. But I'm ready to do it right.”

“Good,” she whispered. If there were tears, she was going to ignore them. “Me too.”

He nodded firmly and kissed her again. It was different kind of kiss now, clearing away the lingering wisps of anger and regret. This is how they did apology and forgiveness. Some things were easier without talking.

"You want to come inside?" he murmured.

She traced her finger around the shell of his ear. “Afraid of bee stings in unmentionable places?”

"I feel like it would put a damper on activities.”

She laughed and kissed him before climbing up. “I find the idea hot,” she said. That day on the deck while at the island sure as hell had been. “But I think we’re too old to fool around on a wood swing of dubious structural integrity.”

"A broken hip will also put a damper on activities.”

They also had employees who lived on the property, the caretaker and staff that took care of vines. They probably didn’t want to accidentally see their boss’s ass. She held out her hands. “Come on.”

He took her hands and they stood. He tucked her arm into his as they walked up to the house. It was adorably formal. “Are we going to waltz?”

"I could have FRIDAY put some music on.”

She opened the back french doors leading to the kitchen. “I don’t doubt you went to Little Lord Fauntleroy’s School of Dance as a kid, but I have no idea how to actually waltz.”

"I could show you," he teased.

She turned and wrapped her arms around his neck. “And risk breaking a hip?” From the ceiling classical music began to play, and Pepper laughed. “FRIDAY, don’t help.”

"No, no, keep it going." Tony tucked an arm around her waist and started to sway her around. "It's romantic.”

It kind of was, so she swayed into it. “That night, the one where you left me on the roof, what possessed you to come over and ask me to dance?”

"You looked beautiful in your blue dress. I felt sort of unsteady and unsure and I knew you'd stabilize me.”

“You know, if you’d gotten enough martinis in me I probably would have gone home with you.” She paused. “And then regretted it in the morning and quit, probably.”

He grinned. "That was not the right time. For either of us.”

She leaned forward to kiss him. “Some things happen for a reason.”

"Yes, they do. Even if we can't see it at the time.”

They’d danced their way into the living room, which was technically in the opposite direction from their bedroom. But maybe this was a couch-is-closer kind of day. “But, you know, I think I was a little in love with you even back then.”

He grinned again, a little cocky and crooked this time. “Yeah?"

By now he had his hands under the bottom hem of her shirt, and it distracted her. “Don’t-Don’t be smug.”

They flattened on her back and slowly skimmed up to the fastening of her bra. "Not even a little smug?”

He unhooked the clasp and she lifted her arms so he could pull it and the shirt over her head. “It was something very different than it is now.”

The bra went with her shirt, leaving her bare to the waist. "It is," he agreed. "It's a little different every time.”

She couldn’t follow the train of thought anymore, and decided she didn’t care. Better use of her time to get his shirt off, anyway. Then she traced her fingers down over the scar on his chest. She remembered when it had been new and he hadn’t wanted her to even see it. 

He lifted a hand and covered hers, holding it over his heart. "You're still all I've got.’

“We’re gonna work on fixing that,” she whispered, leaning up to kiss him. He pressed into her, the kiss taking off into something hot and heavy. The banter was forgotten as he tugged her linen pants down and she fought with the fly of his slacks. They were fancy and had buttons and she really hated them. “Why do you buy these. . .” She couldn’t finish the sentence because his hand was between her legs. He wasn’t even touching anything more than a light skim of his fingers, but anticipation made her ache. 

He nuzzled at the corner of her mouth as his fingers grew a little more explicit, stroking her back and forth as she grew wet. She let it distract her for a moment again, kissing him and sucking on his lower lip. Then she got another on of his buttons open, making enough space to slide her hand in and return the tease. Though making him harder did nothing good for the button situation. 

With a groan, he nudged her towards the couch. "I'll get it.”

“No, I—” She pulled and one of the buttons popped off and went flying. She shrugged and ripped the last one, too. She’d be happy if these pants went in the trash.

“That’s Armani,” he muttered, somehow managing to sound chiding and turned on at the same time.

“You want to talk about my Valentino you shredded in Sydney?" She wrapped her fingers around him and moved them slowly up and down. 

"I bought you-" He hissed air through his teeth. "A new one.”

“I’ll buy you better pants.” She put a knee on the couch to climb onto it. It was one of those ones you sank into when you sat, deep and full of squishy pillows she had to move out of the way. Had been handy propping him up with ice after their last time here. 

The memory jabbed her for a moment. That had been such a painful, awful week.

"Hey," he said softly, kissing her shoulder. "You stiffened up.”

She shook her thoughts off. “Ghosts of bad days,” she whispered. When she kissed him again there was more urgency in it. More need, physical and emotional.

Tony groaned into her mouth and together they collapses back onto the couch, kissing deeply, hands roaming. His hand wandered between her legs again and he tugged them open to give himself room.

She ran her hands over the muscles of his back and shoulders, digging her fingers in a little at the end. She _needed_ him. “God, please.” He nipped at her throat in response, then he was sinking inside her in one long motion, until he was buried to the hilt.

A shudder passed through her, and she could feel her body clench around him. Her hips rocked up to him, as they started to move. He braced on one arm, and took her hand to lace their fingers together, pressing her arm to the cushion above her head. There was something rough about it, like maybe she’d hit one of his nerves, too.

It was the same sort of chemistry they'd had on their trip. That intuitive understanding of what the other wanted, needed. He shifted his hips, putting a foot down on the ground to get a little more leverage and suddenly he was hitting all new spots, deep inside.

It was blinding it felt so good. She reached over her head, grabbing ahold of one of the pillows just to have something to dig her fingers into. The world narrowed to just them, and there. Nothing else existed. She scrambled for the words to tell him harder and faster, but all she could do was mumble incoherently. But he knew somehow, and it was just a little more before something shot through her, sharp and intense. Over the edge she went, coming so hard she screamed, and her whole body shook.

She barely noticed when he joined her, burying himself entirely and shaking roughly with the force of his own orgasm. He nuzzled his face against the crook of her neck as they both tried to catch their breath. She drifted in the echoes of it, her body still trembling. After a few moments, he pushed up on his elbow, and lifted their linked hands so he could kiss the back of hers. She shivered through an aftershock. “I adore you,” she whispered.

He smiled and brushed his mouth on hers. "I adore you.”

She stroked her hand along the side of his face, and brushed his hair back with her fingertips. Sometimes she thought moments like this were more intimate than sex. Maybe this was where the mending really happened.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for missing last week. I had to go take care of my sis who was getting her wisdom teeth out. There will be one more chapter after this one to this story.

It ended up a quiet day. They had some lunch, and they each spent the afternoon doing some work—her in her office, and him in his workshop. He messaged Newbury about the hover chair, and she gave him some useful medical insights. Hiring her had been such a good decision. Even if she did make him take medication.

Pepper was making dinner when he came upstairs, chopping vegetable with a speed that would have cost him a finger. The chopping slowed when he came up behind her and slid his arms around her waist. “Hi.”

“Hello,” she replied, leaning back against him. “Pepper?” She held a piece of red bell pepper over her shoulder. “Don’t make a pun.”

"But it will hurt me if I don't," he said, taking a bite from her fingers.

“Thankfully you have quite the pain tolerance.” 

"That's true. I'm tough and manly.”

She fed him a piece of carrot, and he let his hands wander under her shirt. The knife slowed even more. “Behave.”

"I'm behaving. For certain definitions.” He cupped one breast in his hand, just because he could. She was the one who hadn’t put a bra back on.

His phone was ringing.

Sighing, he pulled it out. "What blew up?”

“Uhh. . .” It was Happy on the other end. “You saw the news?”

Tony pinched the bridge of his nose. "Something actually blew up?”

“Yeah, uh, the plane flying the special stuff up to the compound. The stuff you didn’t want on trucks? That stuff. It, uh, crashed. On the Coney Island beach, actually.”

"Jesus Christ." Pepper was now looking at him with concern. "Where are we on clean up?”

“Everybody’s on it. It’s fine. The thing is. . .”

"There's more thing?”

“It wasn’t an accident. It was that Vulture guy, with the weapons. The one the kid was going on about. Be brought the plane down, trying to steal something.”

Why oh why hadn't he stayed on vacation? "What did he get?”

“Nothing.” There was an extremely suspicious pause, then Happy said. “Because the kid stopped him.”

Peter. With no fucking suit. 

Happy was still talking. “But seriously, don’t be mad at him. He’s a good kid. He tried to call me—had his friend try to call me. But I was loading the plane and I blew him off. Figured I’d call him back in the morning. He wasn’t supposed to be doing anything anymore, right?”

"I know, I know. I'm not mad." Kid had nerves of steel, he had to give him that. "Do you know if he's okay?”

“He tied up the perp and left a nice little note. I. . .I don’t have any other tracking on him. You took his suit.”

"Yeah. I know." Hopefully that meant he was mobile and not in a hospital. "Look, Pepper and I have some stuff to wrap up here, but I'll try to be on your coast tomorrow or the next day. Keep me posted on clean up or if the kid contacts you, okay?”

“I will. Thanks. And I’m so sorry-”

"Don't be, really. There was no way for you to know.”

Pepper had walked into the living room and put the TV, and when he joined her she was standing in front of it watching the news coverage. It didn't look as bad as he'd expected it to be, which was probably more about his threshold for disaster and not the actual level of destruction.

"Apparently, the kid saved my stuff.”

She looked at him. “Without his suit?”

He nodded. "Probably in the footie pajamas he was swinging around in.”

Pepper watched the screen, and he watched her profile. He waited for her to say something he was already thinking. About the unavoidable parallels between him and the kid. About the suit not making you a hero. About the kid needing a suit. About him needing more mentorship or a hundred other things.

“Okay, _seriously_ , Tony, we need to put this kid on our liability insurance.”

He laughed. "I agree one hundred percent.”

They made plans to fly back to New York in the morning. He spent the rest of the evening in his workshop working on Peter’s new suit. If he was going to be an Avenger, he was going to need a better one than the thing Tony had thrown together last time. Pepper had even come down with a book and hung out with him while he worked, letting him bounce things off her, and offering occasional opinions. It was companionable, and made him just really happy.

“Okay,” she said around midnight. “Bedtime. You have to fly tomorrow.”

For once, he didn't fight her. "Yeah. I can do the finishing touches in New York.”

“I didn’t even have to take my shirt off,” she replied. “I’m so proud of you.” If she wanted to pry him away from his workshop so he’d sleep, innuendo seemed to be the best way. Depending on how intensely he was into whatever he was doing, it ran the gamut from tossing her bra at him to the one time she’d started a blow job, stopped in the middle, and told him he had to come to bed if he wanted her to finish. He wondered sometimes if that little game was entirely mercenary, or a kink—like her apparent interest in outdoor sex—that he ought to investigate.

"See?" he said, putting his stuff down and stretching before walking over to her. "I'm growing.”

She held her hand out to him. “You really kinda are.”

He smiled and squeezed her hand. "I'm trying to, anyway.”

“Come on. I’ll take my shirt off upstairs.”

"You do know how to reward my good behavior.”

He worked on the suit on the plane the whole way back, cannibalizing his own suit if he needed for parts. He’d have the real version fabricated as soon as they got back to the compound. 

After landing and having some food, Pepper set up camp in his office, and he went downstairs to check on the build in progress. He sent a message to Newbury that he was back and wanted to show her something.

"I find that a very ominous sentence coming from you," she said when she stepped off the elevator on the lab floor. "Is it going to explode or scan me in anyway?”

“It’s certainly capable of scanning you. That’s part of the point.” He waved her over, and had Friday pull up the hologram render. It was a rather unassuming-looking floating rectangular box, the size of an old steamer trunk. He tapped his screen and it opened, attachments and drawers opening from every direction. “It does full life support, vitals monitoring, diagnostic scanning, medication dispensing and a bunch of other shit—it’s pretty modular. Powered by an arc reactor, floats on repulsers, and is in the same casing as my suit so you could hit it with a tank shell. Takes voice commands, and will even help you carry a stretcher.”

"Huh." That was her impressed sound, as well as her impressed face. He didn't think he'd ever gotten both at once before. "What inspired this?”

“You told me the hardest thing about working for MSF was watching people die that you knew you could easily save if they were in a western hospital. Having the knowledge and not the tools.”

"You do listen to me." She studied the schematics a moment. "So it's fully self propelled?”

“Yeah. Doesn’t fly, though. Can be air dropped but will need a suit.” He paused. “It’s too much power if I made it able to fly. Could be dangerous.”

She considered a moment. "What if you put it in a suit?”

“Like my suit?”

She nodded. "I imagine it would be bulkier. . . but having it attached to the medic would be helpful. Plus, they'd be safer in dangerous areas.”

Wasn’t a half bad idea. “Training would be more with a suit. Could there be use for both? One for wading into combat, another for use at your average remote jungle villiage.”

"Absolutely. There's always a need for that sort of thing. Also generators.”

“That’s a messier problem. We tried that, with arc reactors, and found they made villages with them targets. Governments, gangs, whatever. They’d come steal it and use it to power weapons.” He tapped the console again, and the image disappeared. “You wanna be a tester for this suit thing?”

"Always willing to be a guinea pig.”

On the screen in front of him, he flipped through some of his notes. “Did I ever tell you my father once wanted to make prosthetic limbs?”

Crossing her arms, she leaned a hip on the console. "No, but it makes sense. It had a huge market after the war.”

“The VA said no. They cost too much money. He was pissed and put them away, went back to building bombs. For decades he turned down contracts from them or the military medical corps. They’d had their chance.”

"So your dad was a dick.”

Tony laughed. “He really was.” He pulled up the hospital-in-a-box again. “Look at this thing. How often do you get to build a Fuck You to someone that also saves lives.”

"Oh, stick around the medical community, Stark. You'll be surprised.”

*

“So I was thinking we should hold a press conference,” Pepper said to him over dinner that night. 

"I love press conferences. What about?”

“Spiderman. Introduce him as an Avenger. Get control of the story. We could use some good press.”

"I also love good press." He leaned back in his chair. "Schedule it for afternoon, I can have Happy go get him. He's been wanting to pat the kid on the back, anyway.”

She watched him a moment, then said, “I was also thinking we should build a house.”

His brows lifted. “Upstate?"

“Yes. I don’t want to live full time in this apartment. And I’m definitely going to need more office space and a staff.”

He seemed to consider that a moment. "I'm not opposed.”

“I want to live together. Wherever we are. And if I’m going to be here, I need to be able to run the company from here.”

"It'd be nice to start over. Have a house with no baggage, no memories.”

She smiled at him, happy he understood. “I think part of why we like the vineyard so is that it’s ours.”

"And now we can have one on each coast.”

Her morning was very busy, getting everything arranged and dealing with the press. She talked to their legal and government relations team to check they’d gotten confirmation what they’d told her yesterday: that they could class Peter as what was basically a student or apprentice since he was a minor, and he wouldn’t have to sign the Sokovia Accords until he was an adult. It did, however, make them completely responsible for anything he did as Spiderman. 

Happy went down to the city to pick up the kid from school. Tony was up all night finishing the new Spiderman suit, which they needed because they were going to introduce him masked. He was pretty punchy, but in a very good mood, so she didn’t worry.

Pepper greeted the gathered press and took some general questions, but not telling them what announcement they were here for—though they asked repeatedly. No appreciation of the element of surprise.

“I love watching you do that,” Tony told her when she got off the stage. 

He had his hand on her ass. “What has gotten into you?” She laughed. “Please don’t say scotch.”

"I'm just in a good mood," he said. "I think it's been a while since that happened.” 

He pulled her closer, but before he could kiss her, his watch chimed, and FRIDAY said, “Mr. Hogan and your guest have arrived.”

Tony went to go talk to Peter and get him in his suit, and Pepper went to tell the press they were about to get started. The chorus of questions started again, and she decided to go bring them in herself.

Only when she went out there, it was only Happy and Tony. “Where’s the kid?”

“He left,” Happy said.

Pepper stared. “Everybody’s waiting.”

Tony turned, looking vaguely guilty. “He actually made a really mature choice. It just surprised the heck out of us.”

She would bet a million dollars right now that he hadn’t called the kid—even though he said he was going to—and had instead sprung all of it on him right in the hallway. No wonder he left. “Did you two screw this up?” she asked, even though Happy was likely only tangentially involved.

Happy shook his head, but Tony pointed at him. “He told the kid to go wait in the car.”

“Are you kidding me?” The guilty face didn’t go away, and she marched on him. “I have a room full of people in there waiting for some big announcement. What am I going to tell them?”

“Think of something,” he said casually. She could see him trying to do so, but she bet that being awake for 34 hours hadn’t made him all that sharp. So he went for a joke instead. “Hap, you got that ring? The engagement ring.”

Happy patted his pockets and Pepper rolled her eyes. Then Happy said, “I’ve been carrying this thing since 2008,” and pulled an actual diamond ring out of his pocket. Pepper stared at it, not sure if this was a prank or literally the worlds worst proposal idea. Either might be cause to kill him.

“Okay,” Tony said, managing to convey surprise, discomfort, and panic in one word. The question had been a joke, and he hadn’t known Happy had the ring. She imagined it was some drunken episode Tony didn’t remember and Happy took too seriously. . . like a decade ago. 

Honestly, this man was lucky she loved him. “I think I can think of something better than that.”

She could see him now in full spin mode. “Well, it would buy us a little time.” So, so lucky. She leaned in to kiss him and he mumbled, “Like we need time,” against her mouth.

Then Pepper rolled her eyes and laughed, and went back to the room. “I can’t believe you had that thing in your pocket all this time.”

“Want me to get the door for you, hon?” Tony called.

“I got it,” she said as she pulled it open, trusting he’d follow.


	14. Chapter 14

Sure enough, he was right behind her, causing another round of noise from the reporters. Tony stood behind the podium and scanned the room, waiting a moment before lifting his hands and getting them to quiet down.

"According to recent data, almost 20% of American adults have a diagnosed mental illness. The number of young people with diagnoses is rising. And one in five report having unmet mental health needs." He took a breath. "I know this, because I am one of that 20%. For the last several years, I have been suffering with symptoms of PTSD and generalized anxiety. This has included panic attacks, insomnia, reckless behavior, and damaging personal relationships. Without the support of loved ones and a fantastic therapist, I don't know what might have happened."

Tony paused briefly and flashed his PR smile. "Which is why I'm happy to announce the launch of the Stark Medical team's Mental Health Initiative. We'll be working with professionals across the country to offer low-or-no cost mental health clinics, subsidized medication and other services. Mental illness is a disease, like any other, and it is time we erased the stigma and helped people.”

Of all the things on earth Pepper thought he might concoct, it sure as hell wasn’t _that_. If you’d asked her, she’d have said he was more likely to get up there and talk about his sperm count than PTSD.

People began flinging questions at him— _Do you take medication? What caused it? Are you safe to fly the Iron Man armor?_ —and he answered them calmly. “Nope, but I would if I needed. Start with the chest full of shrapnel and work up from there. And, that’s a ridiculous question as I’ve never flown it any other way. Next?”

She stood there by the side of the stage, hand over her mouth and tears in her eyes.

The questions ranged from insulting to mundane, but he answered for almost an hour before wrapping up and stepping down. The reporters voices chased them all the way through the door.

"We should probably call Yee and make sure she wants to be part of a nationwide mental health initiative." He pulled his phone out. "Oh, look, she's already called me. As has Newbury. Four times.”

“Tony!”

"Yes, dear?”

“You just. . .” She gestured vaguely. “Where did that come from?”

"You told me to think of something. It's been on my mind. It came out.”

“I. . .” She didn’t think she could actually articulate what she was feeling, so she grabbed him by the lapels of his fancy banker suit and kissed him. He made a muffled sound of surprise, but wrapped his arms around her and dipped her. 

Pepper could hear the reporters coming out of the room, so she broke the kiss and hustled him down the hall and through another set of doors into the secure area where the offices were. “You know you probably got about three minutes until Amanda gets up here.”

"I think she'll be happy, though. She likes when I get helpful.”

“Yeah,” Pepper said. “Me too.”

"You definitely seem happy.”

“I am. I’ll even forgive you for that—what was that ridiculous thing with the ring? Did you really tell him to carry one around at all times?”

He waved his hands. "No, no. That was . . . I don't even know what that was.”

“Well, you can tell him he can stop carrying it, because that’s ridiculous.”

"You're right." He reached into his pocket and pulled the ring out. "I think you should carry it.”

She didn’t know why he’d taken it from Happy, but she shrugged, holding out her hand palm up. Whomever had picked it out, it was quite pretty. “Because I carry all your crap. Though I want to mention that I am wearing a dress with no pockets and you’re wearing a suit with like seven.” 

He sighed in exasperation and took her hand, sliding the ring onto her finger. He put it on the ring finger of her left hand, to be specific. “Wait, what are-?”

“Stark!” Amanda came through the doors behind them.

Tony turned towards her. “Hi, Doc.”

"What the hell did I just watch?”

He grinned. “A burst of inspiration.”

"Do you have any idea how complicated that's going to be? When are you planning to launch it? What's the budget? Did Lani know about this?”

“The budget is whatever it needs to be. Which generally greases all the gears that make things complicated.”

Pepper rubbed her forehead. “I’ll get some conversations going with some people in that space.”

Amanda cleared her throat. “Are, uh, congratulations in order?”

“What?” Pepper looked at her hand. “Oh, no, that’s just. . .” She tried to pull it off, and found it wouldn’t get past her knuckle. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.” 

"Right," Amanda said. "I'm not involved." She pointed at Tony. "I'm going back to my office and writing you such an email."

"I look forward to the new and imaginative ways you will insult me.” 

Amanda walked back down the hall. Tony’s phone started ringing again. Pepper stuck her finger in her mouth to try and get the ring off.

"Don't swallow it," he said idly, before answering the phone. "Tony Stark, the line to yell at me starts here.” There was a pause. “So you did see it. Wanna be involved?” He paced away. She assumed that was Dr. Yee.

The ring was still stuck, and yanking on it was only going to make her finger swell more. She sighed and looked at it. It was very pretty. And it tugged at something inside her. Thoughts of a different, much more normal life she might have had. The kind where a man might take her somewhere romantic and get down on one knee. Have a pretty little wedding and go home to a little house with a white picket fence.

Would be a much, much more boring life, though.

Tony paced back to her. "Good news, Yee's in.”

“Exasperated? Proud?”

"Yes. Both those things.”

“Good,” Pepper said. “Me too. But at the moment I need to run home and get some lube.” Both his eyebrows went up and then he smirked. “Get your mind out of the gutter, the ring is stuck.”

“You should keep it on. Fate has spoken.”

“Funny.”

He caught her hand. "I wasn't joking. I was asking you to marry me.”

Apparently, today was not done with shocking things coming out of his mouth. All she could do was blink at him. “You didn’t ask anything, you just put it on my hand.”

"I thought it was romantic. You're usually quicker on the pick up.”

“Because it didn’t occur to me you could be serious. Also, we’re standing in the hallway at your office. There is nothing romantic about it.”

He spread his hands. "It was spontaneous!”

“So is sneezing.”

His mouth twitched. "Okay, that was pretty good.”

It was hard to be serious when he was looking at her like that. She should just say yes. There wasn’t anyone else, and she was just as certain there never would be. And for the first time perhaps ever, she thought they might actually make it to gray hair and rocking chairs. “This is not a thing you do on impulse,” she said, more exasperated than proud at the moment—but not entirely able to keep from laughing. She held her hand up to him. “With a random ring from someone else’s pocket. Who even bought this?” 

"Probably Happy, though I have a memory of pointing at one in a window and saying you'd like it." He smiled his soft sincere smile. "Look, everything I plan fucks up. I could spend a month designing the most romantic proposal in the world and it would get interrupted by aliens or monsters or a stock market crash. I love you. I don't care if we get married next year or in the next decade, but I want the world to know I intend to.”

She reached up and took his glasses off, so she could see his eyes better. He was still watching her intently, and she hung them off the breast pocket of his jacket in front of the neatly folded handkerchief. “You didn’t actually ask.”

He covered her hand with his. "Virginia Potts, will you marry me?”

“Well, I do already have this ring on. . .”

“Hey now, if I have to ask, you have to answer-”

“Yes,” she said immediately, the force of it surprising her. And him, from the look on his face. Maybe he’d expected her to roll her eyes and demand to go down to his machine shop and have it cut off. He’d have smiled and tossed off a joke. The more deeply he felt something, the more he tried to hide it behind wit. It was as much his armor as the suit. Her, too, if she was honest. But right now it all melted away away, and the air was so heavy you could taste it.

"Well," he said softly. “Good."

She kissed him. It was gentle, but the kind where the world shifted. Not a kiss about sex but about promise. Like a on rooftop in the ruins of the Stark Expo. Or a sidewalk outside a shawarma joint. In a burning junkyard while Iron Man suits blew up like fireworks. The first night in their vineyard and a tiny crowded marketplace in Peru.

Pepper nuzzled against his neck and inhaled his scent, as familiar and comforting as anything on this earth. Whatever came next, they'd be all right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first thing we've written in a looong while that could conceivably stay with canon. We'll see how Endgame shakes out to see if there's more in this universe. Thanks for reading, and for all the lovely comments. We do really, really, appreciate them all.


End file.
